AT least 13 people have been killed in a blast outside Gaza City’s biggest hospital, the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza says.
BBC Verify has verified graphic videos showing badly injured and possibly dead people lying outside the hospital.
The Israeli military has confirmed it struck an ambulance that it says was being used by Hamas operatives.
It did not say where the air strike took place.
“An IDF aircraft struck an ambulance that was identified by forces as being used by a Hamas terrorist cell in close proximity to their position in the battle zone,” it said in a statement.
It said a number of Hamas fighters had been killed and accused Hamas of transferring militants and weapons in ambulances, but has not yet supplied evidence of this.
“We emphasise that this area is a battle zone. Civilians in the area are repeatedly called upon to evacuate southwards for their own safety,” it added.
BBC Verify studied three videos – one of which is very graphic – and established that they were filmed outside Al-Shifa and were uploaded on Friday afternoon.
In one video, people were filmed lying in pools of blood in the road next to vehicles – some were severely injured and some were not moving.
There is no crater visible in the footage we’ve seen so far, and no debris or shrapnel visible. There’s damage to the front of an ambulance and some cars on the road have smashed windows.
A Hamas government statement said Israeli forces targeted “a convoy of ambulances which was transporting the wounded” from Al-Shifa hospital Gaza City towards Rafah in the south.
Egypt’s health ministry said just 17 wounded Palestinians were evacuated for treatment in Egyptian hospitals on Friday instead of the 28 originally planned because of the “events” at Al-Shifa.
The head of the World Health Organization said he was “utterly shocked” by the explosion at Al-Shifa.