Netanyahu has come under strong pressure to get the hostages back after US President Donald Trump said Israel had agreed to a 60-day ceasefire with Palestinian militant group Hamas that could lead to their release.
“We will bring them all back,“ he added, in filmed comments released by his office.
“I want the people of Gaza to be safe more importantly,“ Trump told reporters Thursday when asked if he still wanted the US to take over the Palestinian territory, as he announced in February. “They’ve gone through hell.”
- Israeli offensive expands -
Many have sought shelter in school buildings, but these have repeatedly come under Israeli attacks that the military often says target Hamas militants hiding among civilians.
In an updated toll on Thursday evening, he told AFP that 73 people were killed across the territory by Israeli strikes, artillery or gunfire.
Media restrictions in Gaza and difficulties in accessing many areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify the tolls and details provided by the civil defence agency.
Contacted by AFP, the Israeli military said regarding the Gaza city school incident that it “struck a key Hamas terrorist who was operating in a Hamas command and control centre in Gaza City”.
Regarding numerous other strikes across the territory on Thursday, it said it could not comment in detail without precise coordinates and times.
It said it “follows international law and takes feasible precautions to mitigate civilian harm”.
The Israeli military did not immediately respond to AFP’s request for comment on the claim.
At the Gaza City school compound hit on Thursday, AFP footage showed young children wandering through the charred, bombed out building, as piles of burnt debris smouldered.
Umm Yassin Abu Awda, among mourners who gathered at the city’s Al-Shifa hospital after the strike, said: “This isn’t a life. We’ve suffered enough.”
Bassal of the civil defence agency reported 25 people killed while seeking aid near the Netzarim area in central Gaza, six others at another location nearby and seven in Rafah, southern Gaza, with scores of people injured.
The US- and Israeli-backed aid distribution group Gaza Humanitarian Foundation has distanced itself from reports of people being killed while seeking food from its sites.
Israel’s retaliatory military campaign has killed at least 57,130 people in Gaza, also mostly civilians, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry. The United Nations considers its figures reliable. - AFP
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