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Mr Ban Ki-moon

NEW YORK/GAZA CITY. — A deadly attack on a school in the city of Rafah in the south of Gaza has been denounced as a “moral outrage” and “criminal act” by the UN secretary-general, Ban Ki-moon.
At least seven people were killed and dozens more wounded after a projectile struck a street outside the school gates yesterday morning.
The school was sheltering more than 3 000 people displaced by fighting in the area.

It has been the scene of heavy bombardment by the Israeli military and fierce clashes following the suspected capture by Hamas fighters of an Israeli soldier, later declared killed in action.

In a statement, Ban called on those responsible for the “gross violation of international humanitarian law” to be held accountable.
He said the “Israel Defence Forces (IDF) have been repeatedly informed of the location of these sites.”

At the time of the strike –  dozens of children and adults were clustered around the gates buying biscuits and sweets from stalls set up by locals.
The missile struck the ground eight to 10 metres from the open gates.

Witnesses at the scene less than an hour after the explosion claimed it had been fired from one of the many unmanned Israeli drones in the air above Rafah.
United Nations officials in Gaza described a “shelling incident” or an air strike.

It was impossible to determine the exact provenance of the projectile, but it was the third time in 10 days that a UN school had been hit.
Earlier this week, Israeli tank shells struck a school in the northern town of Jabaliya, killing 16 in an attack denounced by the UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, as “reprehensible”.

In all, seven UN schools have been attacked during the conflict.
Israeli spokesmen have previously blamed poorly aimed or malfunctioning Hamas mortar fire or rockets for several such incidents.

Elsewhere in Rafah, more than 30 people were killed in bombing and shelling yesterday morning, bringing the total number of dead in the city in the past 48 hours to more than 100.

The Israeli large-scale offensive which has been going on since July 8 on the Gaza Strip has already killed 1,766 and wounded 9,500 others, the health ministry in Gaza said yesterday.

“During the last 27 days of war on the Gaza Strip, Israel killed so far 1 766 people and wounded 9 500 others, two thirds of them are civilians, including women, children and elderly,” said the health ministry in an emailed statement.

Meanwhile, Israel spied on the US secretary of state John Kerry, during doomed peace talks with the Palestinians last year, the German news weekly Der Spiegel reported yesterday.

The article said the Israelis and at least one other secret service listened in on Kerry’s conversations as he tried to mediate, in a development that Der Spiegel said was likely to further strain ties between Israel and the United States.

Kerry regularly spoke by telephone with high-ranking officials throughout the Middle East during the negotiations that finally collapsed earlier this year.
Der Spiegel, which cited “several sources among secret services”, said that he used not only secure lines but also normal telephones with satellite connections which were vulnerable to tapping.

“The government in Jerusalem used this information in the negotiations on a diplomatic solution in the Middle East,” it said.
Der Spiegel said Kerry’s office and the Israeli government declined to comment on its report.

Kerry made reviving Middle East diplomacy a central priority at the start of his term and coaxed the Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, and the Palestinian president, Mahmud Abbas, back to the negotiating table in July 2013.

But in April this year, Israel made a surprise announcement of plans for 700 new housing units in settlements on occupied territory and refused to free a last batch of Palestinian prisoners after earlier releases.

Abbas in turn sought Palestinian membership in 15 UN conventions and the peace drive eventually broke down. — The Guardian/Xinhua