Many dead as Israeli strikes on the Gaza humanitarian zone lead to a frantic hunt for victims who have been buried

Local rescue officials report that an Israeli strike on a humanitarian zone set up to house displaced people in southern Gaza overnight claimed at least 40 lives. Israel claims the operation was directed at Hamas fighters in the area.

As rescuers rushed to recover victims buried under sand and debris, the Gaza Civil Defense reported that more than 60 people were also injured in the attack.

The organization stated that because of a shortage of supplies and inadequate light, its crews were having "great difficulty" locating victims, many of whom were thought to have been asleep when the strikes occurred.

Monday night in Khan Younis, Gaza, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) announced that they had "struck significant Hamas terrorists who were operating within a command-and-control center embedded inside the humanitarian area."

Hamas denied sending fighters to the region.

Tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians have fled to Al-Mawasi, a coastal area in Khan Younis, where the strike occurred. Many of them are living in tents in an area with limited infrastructure, little access to shelter, and life-saving humanitarian aid.

According to Israel's military, the Israel Security Agency and the Air Force directed the operation, and precautions were taken to minimize harm to civilians, "including the use of precise munitions, aerial surveillance, and additional means." Whether or not the military alerted nearby civilians was not disclosed.

Israel's claims that its fighters were in the region were referred to by Hamas as "a blatant lie, through which it (Israel) seeks to justify these heinous crimes" in their statement.

According to Hamas, the strike claimed the lives of "dozens of unarmed civilians, most of whom were children and women."

Mahmoud Bassal, a spokesman for the Gaza Civil Defense, claimed that the local Palestinian population was unaware of the impending strike.

According to Bassal, there were over 200 tents containing displaced people in the Al-Mawasi area. He also mentioned that between 20 and 40 tents had been destroyed and that "entire families have disappeared in the sand."

According to Gaza Civil Defense, at least five missiles were reported to have struck the area by eyewitnesses. According to Bassal, the explosion left three sizable craters.

He said, "Civil defense and ambulance crews were mobilized to the scene, and there are reports of a large number of killed and wounded."

Social media users were sharing a video of Gaza Civil Defense members searching for missing persons by digging in the sand, which was shared by the Hamas media outlet Al Aqsa TV. There are shoes and clothing strewn all over the place. CNN is unable to independently confirm the video.

When an Associated Press camera operator arrived on the scene, she observed three sizable craters and individuals removing what looked to be a human leg from the sand.

In the sand, the people were buried. Attaf al-Shaar, who was displaced from the southern city of Rafah, told the AP that they were recovered as body parts.

"Systematically abusing civilian and humanitarian infrastructure, including the designated Humanitarian Area, to carry out terrorist activity against the State of Israel and IDF troops," is the charge that the IDF has leveled against Hamas and other militant organizations operating in the Gaza Strip.

Israel has attacked Al-Mawasi in the past while looking for Hamas leaders, and those attacks resulted in a large number of collateral civilian deaths.

At least ninety Palestinians were killed in an attack on Mohammed Deif, the military chief of Hamas, in the middle of July.

The next month, Israel announced that its intelligence community had verified that one of the alleged masterminds of the October 7 attacks, Deif, had been killed in that attack.

Since the start of the conflict, Israel claims to have killed or captured over 14,000 combatants as well as half of Hamas's commanders. In areas of the strip that Israeli forces had previously cleared, they destroyed vast tracts of the surrounding area, but there are indications that the group is making a comeback.