An Israeli air strike on a post belonging to Gaza’s Hamas-run police force has killed at least seven people, including a senior officer and a woman, health and police officials say. Witnesses told the BBC that an Israeli drone fired four missiles at the post near a busy market in the Jabalia area of northern Gaza.

Senior Officer Among the Dead

The Palestinian territory’s Hamas-run interior ministry said the head of the local police station, Col Mohammed Marwan Salem, and several other officers were among those killed in what it condemned as a “massacre”. The Israeli military said Marwan was the head of military security for Hamas’s Central Jabalia Battalion, and that three other “terrorists” were killed alongside him.

It identified them as Abdul Malik al-Jabin, Ghassan al-Daqas and Yaman Abu Obeida, and said the first two men were police officers; the casualties were taken to al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City, where the uncle of another dead police officer insisted he was a civilian.

Civilian Casualties and Response

“He was on duty – part of the civilian police force – patrolling the Fallujah roundabout in a civilian vehicle when he was targeted by surveillance aircraft,” Mohammed Moussa told Reuters news agency. “I want to understand: what was the purpose of targeting him?” he asked.

Another two people were reportedly killed by Israeli fire in southern Gaza on Tuesday. An air strike killed a man and injured three other people in the Khan Younis area, medics told Reuters. The Israeli military said it struck a Hamas operative.

In nearby Rafah, a 10-year-old boy named Muataz Abu Shaar was killed by Israeli gunfire, according to the medics. The boy’s aunt, Suzan Abu Shaar, said he had been “sitting in his tent, getting changed”.

“He was her [his mother’s] support. What is she supposed to do? May God grant her and her heart patience,” she said. “Wherever we go, there is no safety. We want them to stop these massacres. We want them to stop the war.” The Israeli military has not yet commented on that incident.

Broader Conflict and Casualty Counts

Both Israel and Hamas have accused each other of near-daily violations of the ceasefire that took effect in the Palestinian territory last October. Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry has said at least 1,110 people have been killed by Israeli fire since then, while the Israeli military has said four of its soldiers have been killed in Palestinian attacks.

The war was triggered by the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage. Israel responded to the attack by launching a military campaign in Gaza, during which more than 73,230 people have been killed, according to the territory’s health ministry.

An Israeli drone attack has targeted a police station in northern Gaza’s Jabalia camp, killing at least eight people, according to local officials. The attack took place Tuesday afternoon in al-Faluja in western Jabalia, said Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud, reporting from Gaza City. Among those killed were at least six police personnel, including the station’s director, according to Gaza’s Interior Ministry.

A civilian was also killed, the ministry said. It called the attack a “horrific massacre against officers and members of the police force”. AFP cited Gaza’s Palestinian Civil Defence as saying a total of eight people were killed in the attack, including a female officer, with their bodies transferred to al-Shifa Hospital.

“Their job was to maintain some sort of law and order and organisation in an area that is known as a marketplace in the middle of a displacement camp,” Al Jazeera’s Mahmoud said. The Jabalia attack is the latest in a near-daily litany of deadly Israeli strikes in Gaza that have continued regularly despite a “ceasefire” agreed last October.