Israel dropped bombs near a Gaza border crossing packed with civilians who'd followed officials' pleas to flee: reports

Smoke billows from the Gaza's Rafah border crossing with Egypt during an Israeli airstrike on October 10, 2023. Gaza's border crossing with Egypt, its only one that bypasses Israel, was hit by an Israeli air strike on October 10, 2023 for the second time in 24 hours, witnesses and a rights group said. Witnesses said the strike hit the no-man's land between the Egyptian and Palestinian gates, damaging the hall on the Palestinian side.

SAID KHATIB/AFP via Getty Images

• Israel dropped bombs near a Gaza border crossing full of civilians following officials' advice to flee.
• The Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt is the only open path for people to flee the territory.
• The IDF claims the strike did not target the crossing, but an underground smuggling tunnel nearby.

Israel on Tuesday dropped bombs next to the only border crossing allowing civilians to flee Gaza after the Israeli military directed Palestinians, looking to escape air strikes in the war against Hamas, toward the crossing.

Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, an IDF spokesman, urged Palestinians to leave the Gaza Strip for Egypt early Tuesday, with the Times of Israel reporting he said: "Rafah crossing is still open. Anyone who can get out, I would advise them to get out."

This airstrike was the third Israeli attack on the crossing in the last 24 hours and consisted of four missiles, Al Jazeera reported, citing officials from the local Egyptian group, Sinai for Human Rights.

"Most of the travelers were Dual European-Palestinian families fleeing out of Gaza," Younis Tirawi, a Palestinian reporter, posted on X, along with a video of the chaos shortly after the strike landed. "There were casualties." The video appeared to show people screaming and running away as smoke billowed near the crossing.

The bombing disrupted the flow of aid to the Gaza Strip and forced trucks full of supplies for the territory's residents off-course, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing information from a border employee in Gaza.

After the strike, IDF officials said the Rafah border crossing between the Gaza Strip and Egypt was not the specific target in the counter-attack against Hamas and that the bombs were intended to strike an underground smuggling tunnel nearby, per CNN.

The IDF also issued a clarification later Tuesday, after the strike near the Rafah crossing, saying there is "no official call by Israel for residents of the Gaza Strip to exit into Egypt," the Times of Israel reported.

Israel's airstrikes are part of a fierce counteroffensive following a surprise series of attacks by the militant group Hamas that began Saturday. Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu said Gaza will "pay a price" it "has never known" for the attacks, which have so far left at least 1,200 Israelis dead and another 3,000 injured, according to early Wednesday estimates published by The Jerusalem Post.

At least 900 Palestinians have died since the start of the escalation on October 7, per the Palestinian Health Ministry. 

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