Jerusalem, Jul 27 (EFE).- Northern Israel suffered its deadliest attack since the start of the Gaza war on Saturday, as 11 children and teenagers were killed when a projectile fired from Lebanon hit a soccer field and playground in a Druze village in the occupied Golan Heights, the Magen David Amon (MDA) Israeli ambulance service confirmed.
The rocket strike on the town of Majdal Shams also resulted in about 30 injured being taken to hospital, six of them in serious condition, and several victims with symptoms of anxiety, according to the MDA report.
“Our intelligence is clear. Hezbollah is responsible for the killing of innocent children,” Israel’s military spokesman Daniel Hagari said, adding: “We will prepare for a response against Hezbollah… we will act.”
For its part, the Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah denied attacking the town, although it did claim up to seven attacks in other parts of northern Israel on Saturday.
“The Islamic Resistance in Lebanon categorically denies the allegations reported by some enemy media outlets and various media platforms regarding the targeting of Majdal Shams, and confirms that the Islamic Resistance has no connection to the incident at all,” the armed formation said in a terse statement through its official channels.
The spokesman for the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Lebanon (UNIFIL), Andrea Tenenti, told EFE that the organization is in contact with the warring parties to de-escalate tensions.
And the Lebanese government condemned “all acts of violence and aggression against civilians” saying it was “a flagrant violation of international law and goes against the principles of humanity” and called for an “immediate cessation of hostilities.”
Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the leader of the Druze community in Israel that “Hezbollah will pay a heavy price, the kind it has thus far not paid,” according to a statement from his office.
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said in an interview with Israeli TV Channel 12 that with the attack “Hezbollah crossed all red lines” adding that “We are facing an all-out war.”
“Hezbollah, armed and funded by Iran, does not distinguish between child or adult, soldier or civilian, Jew or Muslim, Druze or Christian,” Israeli President Isaac Herzog said.
Israeli Druze are an ethnoreligious minority among the Arab citizens of Israel who make up approximately 1.6% of the country’s population.
The exchange of fire on the border between Israel and Hezbollah began on Oct. 8, the day after war broke out in the Gaza Strip, as Hezbollah showed solidarity with Palestinian Islamist militias in the enclave.
Bloody day in Gaza
Meanwhile, the war in the Gaza Strip continued to claim lives, beginning Saturday with new evacuation orders by the IDF in the southern humanitarian zone of Mawasi, affecting 180,000 Gazans and further shrinking the zone.
Hours later, Israel bombed the field hospital located inside the Khadija School in Deir al-Balah (center of the enclave) with three missiles, killing at least 33 Palestinians, including 15 children, and injuring over 100 persons, according to Gazan authorities.
The IDF justified that attack, by citing “precise (…) intelligence of terrorists operating in a Hamas compound and control center inside the Khadija school”.
In nearly ten months of the Israeli offensive, more than 39,258 Gazans have been killed, more than 90,589 have been injured, and an estimated 10,000 are still trapped under the rubble, according to the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry. EFE
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