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An Israeli airstrike Wednesday hit a central Gaza school, with the besieged territory's civil defence agency reporting 14 killed in the facility-turned-displacement shelter.

The vast majority of the Gaza Strip's 2.4 million people have been displaced at least once by the war, with many seeking safety in school buildings.

Israeli forces have struck several such schools in recent months, claiming Palestinian militants were operating there and hiding among displaced civilians - charges denied by Hamas.

The Al-Jawni school in Nuseirat, already hit several times during the war, was struck again on Wednesday, civil defence agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP.

"The number of martyrs has risen to 14," he said, updating an earlier toll of 10 killed in the "Israeli bombing of Al-Jawni school" which also wounded numerous people.

AFP was unable to independently verify the toll, which the spokesman said included several women and children.

A medical source at Nuseirat's Al-Awda health centre in central Gaza told AFP that 15 people killed in the strike had been brought to hospitals in the area.

Nine were reported taken to Al-Awda and six to Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Hospital in Deir el-Balah, also in central Gaza.

AFP journalists saw several unconscious men and women brought to Al-Aqsa hospital on stretchers, and children arriving in the arms of medics.

"Most of the people took refuge in schools and the schools were bombed and the martyrs were mostly children and women," Basil Amarneh, a local resident, said at the hospital.

"Where will people go?"

Israel's military claimed its air force had "conducted a precise strike on terrorists who were operating inside a Hamas command-and-control centre" on the school grounds, without elaborating on the outcome or the identities of those targeted.

The Gaza government media office said about 5,000 displaced people were sheltering at the school when it was hit on Wednesday.

The school used to be run by the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA.

UNRWA said six staffers were killed in the attack, marking what it said was the highest death toll among its staff in a single incident.

"Among those killed was the manager of the UNRWA shelter and other team members providing assistance to displaced people," UNRWA said on X.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told Reuters on Wednesday that a lack of accountability for the killing of United Nations staff and humanitarian aid workers in Gaza was "totally unacceptable".

Al-Jawni has been hit at least five times in more than 11 months of war, Bassal said.

In July, at least 16 people were killed in an Israeli airstrike on the facility that the military claimed had targeted "terrorists".

Israel's military offensive since the war began on October 7 has killed at least 41,084 people in Gaza, according to the territory's health ministry. The UN rights office says most of the dead are women and children.

The October 7 Hamas-led attack on southern Israel that triggered the war resulted in the deaths of 1,205 people, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures, which also includes hostages killed in captivity.

(Agencies)