Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said a strike on a Gaza hospital which killed at least 20 people was a “tragic mishap.”
On Monday, two Israeli strikes hit a hospital in the southern Gaza Strip, the Hamas-run health ministry said.
Among those killed in the strike, which was caught on a live stream, were five journalists who had worked with Reuters, AP, Al Jazeera and the Middle East Eye, the news outlets confirmed. This brings the number of journalists killed in Gaza since the start of the war there in October 2023 to nearly 200.
The World Health Organization has said four health workers were also killed in the double-tap strike.
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Speaking after the strike, Netanyahu’s office said in a statement on X that the strike was a “tragic mishap” which Israel’s “deeply regrets.”
The statement claimed that Israel “values the work of journalists, medical staff, and all civilians”, and added that military authorities were “conducting a thorough investigation.”
The Nasser hospital attack has been widely condemned by the international community. French President Emmanuel Macron said the strikes were “intolerable, and urged that civilians and journalists “must be protected in all circumstances”.
Germany’s foreign office said it was “shocked” by the attack, whilst Turkey’s head of communications said Israel had “committed yet another crime against humanity”.
In the UK, foreign secretary David Lammy said he was “horrified” by the attack.
When pushed for a response to the attack on Monday, US president Donald Trump simply said: “I don’t want to see it.”