21 killed in Israeli attack on tent camp near Rafah

AT LEAST 21 people have died following Tuesday’s attack by an Israeli tank on a campsite in al-Mawasi in Gaza, located near Rafah. 

The Palestinian emergency services reported this incident which occurred two days after Israel launched an airstrike on Tel al Sultan, igniting a fire in a displacement camp. During this attack, at least 45 were killed, half of them women and children.

Four tank shells reportedly hit a tent camp filled with displaced families. Medical officials in the Palestinian enclave said that of those killed, at least 12 were women. 

Gaza’s health ministry also noted that 64 were wounded, and 10 were in critical condition. 

Israeli military previously said that al-Mawasi was a humanitarian zone that Palestinians could evacuate to. Hence, there are makeshift tent camps in the area, where many women and children stayed. 

Journalist Hind Khoudary of Al Jazeera said Palestinians do not trust Israeli forces because they are targeted any time they attempt to relocate. She added that there was no place safe across the Gaza Strip and that there were no hospitals in Rafah for the injured or the dead. There were no ambulances either. 

The Israeli military denied attacking al-Mawasi. Their May 26 attack on Tel al Sultan was quickly met with global condemnation. The airstrike had led to an influx of patients with severe injuries and burns from the airstrike arrived at the Red Cross field hospital in Rafah.

“We experienced first-hand the horror of this war, witnessing the appalling injuries and death. We had a mass casualty incident with about 30 patients, seven of them in critical condition with massive bleeding. Nine patients had horrendous orthopaedic injuries, and about 18 were injured,” said senior medical officer Sandy Inglis.

Medical staff at the Red Cross field hospital were already dealing with an influx of patients with severe injuries due to ongoing fighting, and increasing communicable diseases that could lead to potential outbreaks and complications related to chronic conditions. 

The field hospital is a combined effort of 12 Red Cross National Societies to help address the overwhelming medical needs emanating from the ongoing conflict. Teams from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), a neutral humanitarian organization, have also been providing surgical services at the European Gaza Hospital since November 2023, as well as supporting other hospitals through medical donations, assisting thousands of patients since the escalation of the conflict.  

The Tel al Sultan attack was even called a “tragic mistake” by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, wherein the Israeli military’s initial investigation into the strike indicated that the fire was due to a secondary explosion. 

The subsequent attack on al-Mawasi has added fuel to the fire. 

“All eyes on Rafah”

Following the continued attacks on Rafah, people have continued to show their vocal support for Palestine online. 

Most recently, an AI-generated image that read “All Eyes on Rafah” has been circulating the Internet, and has been shared by over 44 million Instagram accounts following Israel’s most recent airstrike on Tel al Sultan. 

The image shows densely packed rows of tents in a desert, depicting the very difficult situation faced by many Palestinians in Gaza. 

Notable celebrities who have shared this photo are Chilean-US actor Pedro Pascal, and models Bella and Gigi Hadid, who are of Palestinian descent.

Since the airstrike, the hashtag #alleyesonrafah has reached almost 1 million hits on social media, with over 27.5 million messages being posted on X within just three days of the attack. 

The Gaza ministry said that at least 36,050 Palestinians have been killed since the start of the escalation of the conflict in October 2023. Around 81,026 people have been injured.