may 27, 2024 - "Netanyahu admits civilians were killed in latest Israeli strike on Rafah: ‘Tragic mistake’" NY Post 2024, May 27

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Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday blamed a “tragic mistake” for displaced civilians getting killed in a tent city in Rafah, a strike that sparked widespread condemnation, even from key allies.

The prime minister addressed his parliament Monday as Hamas-run health officials reported Sunday’s attack on Gaza killed 45 people, including women and children — and as an Egyptian soldier was killed in a separate gunfight in the border region, further stoking tensions.

“Despite our utmost efforts not to harm innocent civilians, last night, there was a tragic mistake,” Netanyahu told the Knesset Monday of Sunday’s strikes sparking a giant blaze in the tent city.

“We are investigating the incident and will obtain a conclusion because this is our policy,” he added above shouted objections from opposition members.Israel had initially called it a counterattack “against legitimate targets” after Hamas for the first time in months fired a barrage of rockets Sunday.

The strike eliminated Hamas’ chief of staff for the second and larger Palestinian territory, the West Bank, plus another official behind deadly attacks on Israelis, the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) said.

However, Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry claimed that more than half of the dead were women, children, and elderly people who’d fled to the area after being displaced by violence elsewhere. The death toll will likely rise with many left with severe burns, according to those officials.

The Israeli military’s top legal official said authorities were examining the strikes and that the military regrets the loss of civilian life.

Still, Military Advocate General Maj. Gen. Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi warned that such tragedies are inevitable “in a war of such scope and intensity.”

Rafah, which is on the border with Egypt, has been packed with over one million people who were displaced from other parts of Gaza earlier in the Israel-Hamas war.....

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