At least eight Palestinians killed in Israeli attacks across Gaza

Four-year-old among eight Palestinians killed in Israeli drone attacks across the Gaza Strip.

At least eight Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli military in Gaza, hospital sources told Al Jazeera.

An Israeli drone attack killed five people and wounded several others in al-Mawasi, west of Khan Younis, in southern Gaza on Sunday.

There, Israeli forces targeted a number of police officers carrying out their duties, according to Gaza’s Ministry of Interior.

“They were targeted as they were doing their jobs,” says Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud, reporting from Gaza City.

The Israeli army told the AFP news agency that it was targeting “a terrorist” in southern Gaza.

In northern Gaza, at least three Palestinians, including a four-year-old boy, were killed in a drone attack on Gaza City’s Rimal neighbourhood, sources at al-Shifa Hospital said. The Taj Mall was also targeted.

Another person died on Sunday from wounds sustained during a previous attack.

Hamas condemned the latest Israeli attacks as a “deliberate war crime”.

In a statement on Sunday, it denounced the “horrific massacre” that targeted a group of police officers as well as the “bombardment of Gaza City” that killed and wounded civilians.

The deliberate and repeated targeting of police officers while they perform their duties is part of Israel’s “attempt to obstruct recovery efforts, undermine stability in the Gaza Strip, and sow chaos”, the statement said, adding that “international silence and the failure to confront these horrific crimes only embolden the occupation”.

“This is yet another chapter in the ongoing series of Zionist atrocities against our Palestinian people … a continuation of the genocidal war whose tragic unfolding our people are still enduring,” Hamas said.

Israeli forces continue to attack Gaza, despite a US-brokered “ceasefire” taking effect last October, killing more than 1,500 people since then.

At least 74,594 Palestinians have been killed since Israel launched its genocidal war in October 2023, in response to the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health.