An explosion rocked a historic Greek Orthodox church in Gaza City on Thursday night amid Israel's continued bombardment of the Gaza Strip, as the country's military prepared to enter the Palestinian territory to destroy the Hamas militant group.
Videos emerged early on Friday of apparent damage and casualties at the St. Porphyrios Orthodox Church in Gaza City; the region's oldest church that was reportedly serving as a shelter for hundreds of Palestinians displaced in Israel's 13-day-old military campaign.
Palestinian authorities and the Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem blamed the Israeli military. The Patriarchate published a statement in which it expressed "its strongest condemnation of the Israeli airstrike that have struck its church compound in the city of Gaza."
Thursday's attack, it added, "constitutes a war crime that cannot be ignored."
Gaza authorities reported—as quoted by Reuters—that 18 Palestinian Christians had been killed.
Newsweek is unable to independently verify the figures.
During a press briefing on Friday morning, Israel Defense Forces spokesperson Lt. Col. Richard Hecht told
Newsweek that the Israeli military was reviewing the incident, though added it was "very aware" of "some damage to the church."
Hecht said the IDF was planning to release visual confirmation of "what happened" and "what we were targeting," suggesting the information would be released "shortly" and that the Israeli military was "working hard" to provide clarity.
The IDF spokesperson's unit later told
Newsweek in a statement that it was responsible for damage to the church, but that it "can unequivocally state that the Church was not the target of the strike."
"Last night, IDF fighter jets targeted the command and control center belonging to a Hamas terrorist, involved in the launching of rockets and mortars toward Israel," the unit said.
"The command and control center was used to carry out attacks against Israel, and contained infrastructure belonging to the Hamas terrorist organization," it said. "As a result of the IDF strike, a wall of a church in the area of the center was damaged. We are aware of reports of casualties. The incident is under review."
"Hamas intentionally embeds its assets in civilian areas and uses the residents of the Gaza Strip as human shields," the unit added. "In order to minimize civilian harm, the IDF sent a request to the residents of the northern area of the Gaza Strip to evacuate southward of Wadi Gaza."
"The IDF continues to call on the residents in the area of northern Gaza to evacuate in accordance with the IDF's instructions," it said.
The Israeli military has been criticized for its evacuation order for around 1 million Gazans in the northern portion of the Strip. The Untied Nations rejected last week's ultimatum as "impossible," and warned it could precipitate a humanitarian crisis. Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have left northern Gaza in the week since the Israeli warning.
The incident at St. Porphyrios comes shortly after this week's explosion at the
al-Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza City. That strike set off a fierce information war, with Palestinian militants blaming the IDF, and the Israeli military releasing evidence it said showed the culprit was an errant Palestinian Islamic Jihad rocket.
President
Joe Biden said he does not believe Israel was responsible, a conclusion echoed by
U.S. intelligence. Hamas has vowed to
produce evidence proving Israeli culpability but has not yet done so.
The St. Porphyrios church has already been the subject of disinformation efforts during the latest Gaza conflagration. Last week, social media users falsely claimed that the structure had been destroyed in an Israeli airstrike.
Israel's bombardment of Gaza continued on Friday morning, while IDF units prepared for a long-awaited ground invasion. Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant told troops on the Gaza frontier on Thursday they would soon see the Strip "from the inside."
The Associated Press cited the latest figures from the Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry, saying that 3,785 people have been killed in Gaza since October 7. Nearly 12,500 have been injured, 1 million displaced, and 1,300 people are believed buried under rubble.
The Israeli campaign came after Hamas launched its "Operation Al-Aqsa Flood" infiltration and rocket attack on southern Israel on October 7. More than 1,400 people were killed, with around 200 more abducted and taken to Gaza.
Update, 10/20/23, 9:08 a.m. ET: This article has been updated to include additional comment from the Israeli military.
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