Al-Sardi school attack

On 6 June 2024, at approximately 2am, Israeli forces struck Al-Sardi, a UNRWA-run school complex in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza, with two missiles. Although the school had not been used for education since the outbreak of the Gaza war, UNRWA said approximately 6,000 displaced people were using the complex for shelter at the time. The strike hit classrooms on the school's highest floor and came after the Israeli military announced new ground assaults and airstrikes on several refugee camps in central Gaza.

Casualty figures varied by source. Shuhada al-Aqsa Hospital and the Gaza Health Ministry, along with witnesses interviewed by The Guardian, reported at least 33 Palestinians killed, including 9 children, 3 women and 21 men. UNRWA, citing testimony from its own employees at the school, reported at least 35 dead. An Associated Press journalist counted 33 bodies but did not examine beneath the burial shrouds. Initial estimates had put the toll higher, at around 40 dead including 14 children and 9 women, with more than 74 wounded, before figures were revised downward. Residents said the strike hit areas housing men and boys, while women and girls slept in a separate part of the school; at least one elderly man was among the dead, and two children were reported killed alongside their mother.

The Israel Defense Forces said it had struck Palestinian Islamic Jihad militants who it alleged were directing attacks from the school while using it as shelter, and said extensive precautions were taken to reduce harm to civilians. Israel said it killed 20–30 militants and released the names of 17 individuals it identified as fighters, without providing further supporting evidence. Eight of these names did not match hospital records, and one named individual was recorded by the hospital as an eight-year-old boy. An IDF spokesperson said the military was not aware of any civilian casualties, a statement the New York Times noted was contradicted by witness and medical accounts of dozens of civilian deaths. Rescuers said they recovered only civilian bodies from the site, and the director of the Gaza Government Media Office rejected Israel's claim that the school concealed a Hamas command post.

Analysis by CNN of video from the scene, corroborated by an explosive weapons expert, identified fragments of at least two US-made GBU-39 small-diameter bombs. The Washington Post reported that weapons experts and cage-code markings on fragments traced the munitions to a US-registered manufacturer.

The attack drew condemnation from the United Nations Secretary-General, UN humanitarian officials, UNRWA's head, Belgium, the European Union's top diplomat, and Oxfam, among others. The US State Department called for Israeli transparency but said the strike did not "cross a red line" set by President Biden regarding a large-scale Rafah operation. Gaza's Government Media Office director described the strike as a massacre and evidence of broader violations against civilians.