GAZA STRIP: A pair of Israeli strikes in Gaza’s southern city of Khan Younis early on Thursday killed five people, hospital officials said, bringing the death toll from airstrikes in the Palestinian territory over a roughly 12-hour period to 33. 

The strikes have been some of the deadliest since Oct. 10 when a US-brokered ceasefire took effect.

Four Israeli airstrikes on tents sheltering displaced people in Khan Younis late on Wednesday and early on Thursday killed 17 people, including five women and five children.

In Gaza City, two airstrikes on a building killed 16 people, including seven children and three women, according to officials at the Al-Shifa Hospital in the northern part of the city where the bodies were taken.

Hamas condemned the Israeli strikes as a “shocking massacre.” In a statement, Hamas denied firing toward Israeli troops as claimed by the Israeli army.

At Nasser Hospital, scores of people gathered to offer funeral prayers for those who were killed. Women wailed in mourning over the bodies of loved ones wrapped in white burial shrouds.

Among the mourners was Abir Abu Moustapha, who lost her three children and her husband in an Israeli strike that hit their tent. She squatted beside their bodies as they were prepared for burial.