At least 18 Palestinians have been killed after an Israeli drone strike targeted a Hamas police unit trying to take control of a market in the central Gaza city of Deir al-Balah, a doctor and witnesses told the BBC, quoted by BNR.
Witnesses reported that Israeli drones fired on members of a Hamas police force dressed in civilian clothes and wearing masks who were confronting vendors accused of inflating prices and selling goods looted from aid trucks.
The The Hamas interior ministry condemned the strike, accusing Israel of committing "another crime against a police unit tasked with maintaining public order".
A witness told the BBC that clashes broke out on Thursday after police confronted vendors, with the unit's commander telling them to "either sell at a fair price or we will confiscate the goods".
But then some of the vendors pulled out pistols, and one even a Kalashnikov, according to one witness. Israeli drones then fired two missiles, locals said.
Video footage of the aftermath showed bodies strewn on the ground and panicked shoppers screaming as ambulances rushed to tend to the wounded. A doctor at Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir al-Balah told the BBC that 18 bodies had been brought to the morgue. It was not clear how many of those killed were police officers.