Between the night of Wednesday, June 5, and the morning of Thursday, June 6, Israeli forces bombed al-Sardi school, a United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) school sheltering hundreds of Palestinian families in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza. The attack killed over forty civilians, most of them children. Health officials in Gaza expect that number to rise as dozens of casualties continue to arrive at hospitals, with many others still buried under rubble.

The massacre was carried out by Israel without prior warning, and despite knowledge that the school was crowded with displaced families, including sleeping children. According to UNRWA, over six thousand people were taking shelter.

Following the attack, the school grounds resembled a bloodbath. Remains of bodies were strewn across the area. Horrific footage shows Palestinians collecting body parts and remains of children scattered inside the bombarded school. Ayman Rashed, a shelter resident displaced from Gaza City who helped carry five bodies out from the wreckage, including an old man and two children, said the blast had shattered one child’s skull open. “It was dark, with no electricity, and we struggled to get out the victims,” he told Associated Press reporters.