Extract from ABC News
Israeli strikes on a tent camp in an evacuation area west of Rafah have killed at least 21 people, Gaza health authorities said, with more than 60 others injured.
Two days after an Israeli air strike on another camp stirred global condemnation, Gaza emergency services said four tank shells hit a cluster of tents in Al-Mawasi on Tuesday local time — a coastal area that Israel had advised civilians in Rafah to move to for safety.
At least 12 of the dead were women, according to medical officials in Gaza.
The Hamas-run health ministry said at least 64 others were injured.
The Israeli army denied it struck the area.
"Contrary to the reports ... the IDF (Israel Defence Forces) did not strike in the Humanitarian Area in Al-Mawasi," the military said in a statement.
In central Rafah, tanks and armoured vehicles mounted with machine guns were spotted near Al-Awda mosque, witnesses told Reuters.
The Israeli military said its forces continued to operate in the Rafah area, without commenting on reported advances into the city centre.
International unease over Israel's three-week-old Rafah offensive has turned to outrage after an attack on Sunday set off a blaze in a tent camp in a western district of the city, killing at least 45 people.
Israel said it had targeted Hamas commanders and had not intended to cause civilian casualties.
Global leaders voiced horror at the fire in a designated "humanitarian zone" of Rafah where families uprooted by fighting elsewhere had sought shelter, and urged the implementation of a World Court order last week for a halt to Israel's assault.
Tuesday's attack occurred in an area designated by Israel as an expanded humanitarian zone, to which it had called on civilians in Rafah to evacuate for their own safety when it launched its incursion in early May.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday condemned Sunday's deadly air strikes and called for the horror and suffering to stop immediately, his spokesperson said.
"The Israeli authorities must allow, facilitate and enable the immediate, safe and unhindered delivery of humanitarian assistance to those in need and all crossing points must be open," UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said.
Last hospital in Rafah under threat
A World Health Organization (WHO) official said the last hospital in Rafah could become non-functional and a substantial number of deaths could be expected if Israel launches a "full incursion" into the southern Gazan city.
"If the incursion would continue, we would lose the last hospital in Rafah," Richard Peeperkorn, the WHO representative for Gaza and the West Bank, said on the side-lines of the World Health Assembly in Geneva.
He said that in the case of a "full incursion", the "contingency plan" "will not prevent what we expect: substantial additional mortality and morbidity."
Mr Peeperkorn said that of the three hospitals in Rafah, only one was "barely functional".
He said the El-Najar Hospital, which had previously serviced 700 dialysis patients, was no longer operating.
Rafah was a major entry point for humanitarian relief before Israel stepped up its military offensive on the Gaza side of the border earlier this month and seized control of the crossing from the Palestinian side.
He said its closure had had a direct impact on WHO's ability to get medical supplies into Gaza.
"Almost 100 per cent of the medical supplies, essential medicines, equipment, they actually come from Al-Arish (in Egypt) through the Rafah crossing," he said.
"There are currently 60 trucks that are in Al-Arish waiting to get into Gaza."
Since the Rafah closure, WHO has only been able to get three medical supply trucks through Kerem Shalom, a crossing from Israel, he said.
Separately, UNICEF spokesperson James Elder said that a typical person in Rafah had access to around just one litre of water per day, "catastrophically below any emergency level".
The ongoing challenge getting aid to Gaza looks set to continue, with the US military reportedly suspending aid deliveries to the Gaza Strip by sea after bad weather damaged the temporary pier it had set up, NBC News reported on Tuesday, citing unnamed officials.
The US military is expected to make the announcement later on Tuesday, NBC said in its report, which cited a UN official, a US official and an Israeli official.
The pier was announced by US President Joe Biden in March and involved the military assembling the floating structure off the coast.
It was estimated to cost $US320 million ($481 million) for the first 90 days and involve about 1,000 US service members, it went into operation two weeks ago.
Pentagon spokesperson Sabrina Singh said a portion of the pier had separated and that the pier would be towed over the next 48 hours to Ashdod port in Israel for repairs.
Ms Singh added the pier would take over a week to repair and then returned to its place off the coast of Gaza.
Since the pier began operations, the United Nations has transported 137 trucks of aid from the pier — the equivalent of 900 metric tonnes —a UN World Food Programme spokesperson said.
Reuters
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