Hundreds feared dead in Gaza hospital blast as Israel, Hamas blame one another

Oct. 17 (UPI) -- Hundreds are feared dead Tuesday after explosions rocked Gaza's Al Ahli Arab Hospital, where thousands of civilians had sought shelter amid Israel's fight with Hamas militants, according to local reports.

Palestinians in the region blamed Israel for the attack; Israeli military leaders blamed the deadly blast on errant weapons fired from within Gaza.

Daniel Magari, a spokesperson for the Israel Defense Forces, said during a news conference he will present evidence the IDF were not responsible for the strike in the Gaza Strip.

"We don't have any indication that it hit the hospital, Magari said, "but it does not fit the footage that we have in the hospital."

After the blast, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas canceled his meeting with U.S. President Joe Biden, according to Palestinian officials who said Abbas was traveling back to Ramallah and had called an urgent meeting of the Palestinian leadership for Tuesday night.

Biden has not canceled his planned visit to Israel, where he seeks to demonstrate staunch support for the country while also pressing for ways to ease humanitarian suffering in Gaza, where water and food supplies are dwindling for hundreds of thousands of displaced people.

Later, NBC reported comments from Jordan's foreign minister, who said the planned meeting between Biden and the leaders of Jordan, Egypt and the Palestinian Authority will not happen on Wednesday because of the hospital's deadly destruction.

"The Al-Ahli Hospital massacre in the heart of Gaza Strip is a genocide. Enough silence on the aggression and recklessness of the occupation," Hamas said in a statement, according to a report by CNN.

The World Health Organization condemned the incident, calling "for the immediate active protection of civilians and health care."

"Evacuation orders must be reversed," WHO officials said in a statement. "International humanitarian law must be abided by, which means health care must be actively protected and never targeted."

Meanwhile, Palestinian officials now say at least 3,000 people have been killed in Gaza since the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas that killed over 1,300 Israelis and resulted in hundreds of Israeli citizens being taken hostage.

Also, Palestinian officials say 61 people have been killed in the West Bank, too.

In the apparent attack on the hospital on Tuesday, Sky News reports that a spokesperson for Gaza's Ministry of Health estimated the number of deaths is in the hundreds.

"Initial estimates indicate that between 200 and 300 martyrs were killed in the bombing that targeted Baptist Hospital in Gaza city," a spokesperson for the Ministry of Health said, according to Sky News.

ABC News quoted an unnamed Israeli Defense Forces spokesperson as saying the hospital blast was caused by a failed rocket launch by Hamas, not IDF weapons.

Tal Heinrich, a spokesperson for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, told CNN that the "IDF does not target hospitals."

Unconfirmed images and video shared by local media show dead and injured people at the hospital in the aftermath of the strike.

CNN also reports that the Ministry of Health in Gaza says hundreds are likely to have been killed.

ABC reports that the Ministry of Health also said the death toll in the hospital strike likely exceeds 500 people, and that Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas has declared three days of mourning in the wake of the bombing.

Meanwhile, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, the U.N. body that addresses Palestinian refugees, confirmed Tuesday that a school under its supervision in Gaza has been targeted, killing six people.

"At least 6 people were killed this afternoon when an UNRWA school was hit in the al-Maghazi refugee camp. This is outrageous and it again shows a flagrant disregard for the lives of civilians. No place is safe in Gaza anymore, not even U.N. facilities," the UNRWA posted on X Tuesday.

Meanwhile, the Israeli military has released footage it says shows a bombing attack that killed senior Hamas leader Ayman Nofal.

On Tuesday, Hamas confirmed that Nofal had been killed, according to the Israeli news outlet i24News.

Israel has vowed to wipe out Hamas, the Islamist group that controls Gaza, in response to the October 7 terrorist attacks.

Earlier versions of this story misidentified the name of the hospital in Gaza that was destroyed.