The Israeli military carried out an airstrike on a hospital in Gaza City early Sunday, after telling staff and patients to evacuate ahead of the overnight attack, one of a series of strikes that Israel said was targeting Hamas operational centers.

According to the Israel Defense Forces and Shin Bet security agency, the strike targeted a Hamas command center embedded within the al-Ahli Baptist Hospital.

No casualties were reported in the hospital strike, with Israel issuing a warning to evacuate the facility before the attack.

Another Hamas command center was also struck in central Gaza’s Deir al-Balah around noon Sunday, as numerous Hamas operatives were at the facility, the IDF and Shin Bet said.

Palestinian media reported that the strike hit Deir al-Balah’s municipality building and that three people were killed in the strike.

The IDF and Shin Bet said Hamas used both compounds — at the hospital and in Deir al-Balah — to plan and carry out attacks against troops and Israeli civilians.

In both strikes, the military said it took steps to mitigate civilian harm, including using “precision munitions” and aerial surveillance. At the hospital, the IDF also provided an early warning to civilians in the area.

“The Hamas terrorist organization systematically violates international law, while brutally exploiting civilian buildings and the civilian population as human shields for terrorist operations,” the army said, calling on the terror group to cease using medical facilities as cover.

Medics at Al-Ahli said two Israeli missiles had hit a building at the medical center overnight, destroying the emergency and reception department and damaging other structures.

Hospital officials evacuated the patients from the building after one person said he had received a warning call from someone who identified himself with Israeli security forces shortly before the attack took place.

The Baptist Church in Jerusalem and the Middle East, which oversees the hospital, said in a statement that the IDF had ordered all patients, employees and displaced people to evacuate the premises only 20 minutes before the attack.

One child who previously suffered a head injury died as a result of the rushed evacuation process, the church said.

Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry claimed that the hospital was now out of operation because of the attack.

“Hundreds of patients and injured people had to be evacuated in........

© The Times of Israel