An Israeli air strike on Tuesday (October 17) killed around 500 Palestinians at a Gaza City hospital crammed with patients and displaced people, health authorities in the besieged enclave said.

The strike was the single bloodiest incident in Gaza since Israel launched an unrelenting bombing campaign against the densely populated territory in retaliation for a deadly cross-border Hamas assault on southern Israeli communities on October 7.

It took place on the eve of a visit by US President Joe Biden to Israel to show support for the country in its war with Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip.

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The health minister in the Hamas-run government of Gaza, Mai Alkaila, accused Israel of a massacre. However, the Israeli military denied responsibility for the blast at the hospital, suggesting it was hit by a failed rocket launch by the enclave's Palestinian Islamic Jihad military group.

(Production: Bernat Parera)

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