Gaza authorities said 25 people died as a result of the Israeli attack on Mawasi

Gaza health officials said 25 people were killed and 50 injured Friday when an Israeli military attack targeted tents of displaced people in Al-Mawasi, a coastal community in the southern Gaza Strip, near the city of Rafah.

The report could not be independently verified and the Israeli military said “the incident is under review.”

Al-Mawasi has an area where the Israeli military has asked those fleeing the fighting in Rafah to move for safety, although such areas have also come under fire during the war. Gazan officials’ accounts made it unclear whether the attack was in the area.

The Israeli military said its initial investigation showed “no signs” of an attack in a safer area. It did not say whether it happened elsewhere in Al-Mawasi, but photos and videos from the scene clearly showed that there had been a strike.

Dr. Marwan Al-Homs, coordinator of the Red Cross field hospital in Al-Mawasi, said the majority of the casualties brought to the hospital were women and children as well as some young men.

The Palestinian Red Crescent said its volunteers counted 18 dead and 35 injured after the attack. Gaza health officials later put the higher toll at 25 dead and 50 injured.

It is unclear what the target of the attack is. Hamas and allied groups at war with Israel regularly operate among the population. Israel says civilians suffer casualties as it targets militants; Palestinians accuse Israel of indiscriminate attacks, even targeting non-combatants.

Rafah, which borders Egypt, has been the focus of Israel’s military campaign since early May. About a million displaced people from other parts of Gaza flocked to Rafah earlier in the war, then again. fled when the Israeli offensive there began. Many of them have gone to Al-Mawasi, where aid groups say shelter, sanitation, water and food are poor.

In the past, the Al-Mawasi area also suffered Israeli attacks, leading to the deaths of dozens of civilians sheltering in tents.