Gaza authorities said an Israeli airstrike killed five Palestinian journalists outside a hospital on Thursday but the Israeli army said it had attacked a vehicle carrying Islamic Jihad militants.

Medics said the five were among at least 21 people killed in Israeli air assaults across the Palestinian enclave before dawn as Hamas and Israel traded blame over delays in reaching a ceasefire deal after more than 14 months of fighting.

The Palestinian Journalists Union said one strike killed five journalists from the Al-Quds Today channel who were in a broadcast vehicle in front of Al-Awda Hospital in the Al-Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza.

The union said more than 190 Palestinian journalists have been killed by Israeli fire since the war began in October 2023.

The Gaza-based channel called the strike a massacre and said in a statement on Telegram the five “were killed as they carried out their media and humanitarian duty.”

The Israeli military said it “conducted a precise strike on a vehicle with an Islamic Jihad terrorist cell inside in the area of Nuseirat.”

Israel has regularly denied targeting journalists and says it takes steps to avoid hitting civilians.

The Iranian-backed Islamic Jihad group, an ally of Hamas, fought several rounds against Israel in the past two decades, and fighters of the group have joined the fighting against Israel since October 2023. It said it has hostages in its custody too.

Hamas said that Israel had laid down further conditions.

Israel’s campaign against Hamas in Gaza has killed more than 45,300 Palestinians, according to health officials in the Hamas-run enclave. Most of the population of 2.3 million has been displaced and much of Gaza is in ruins.

The war was triggered by Hamas’ attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023, in which 1,200 people were killed and 251 taken hostage to Gaza, according to Israeli tallies.

Funerals

Video from the scene of Thursday’s attack showed the twisted wreckage of a white van with what appeared to be the remnants of the word “PRESS” in red on the back doors.

Later on Thursday, dozens of relatives and fellow journalists took part in the funerals of the five journalists, whose bodies were wrapped in white shrouds. Blue flak jackets bearing the word “PRESS” were placed on top of the shrouded bodies.

“The Israeli army justifies or excuses this targeting by claiming it is aimed at individuals involved in Palestinian organisations and cells. However, on the ground, these individuals were on journalistic assignments, residing in press vehicles and covering events,” said Abed Meqdad, a correspondent for Al-Araby TV channel during the funerals.

Women wept beside the bodies as men performed special prayers before burials.

“May God take revenge on them, may God take revenge on them. He’s the one that makes the news and broadcasts the crimes to the world, this is what they do to them,” said the mother of Fadi Hassouna, one of the dead journalists.

Medics in the enclave said eight other people were killed and 20 wounded in an Israeli airstrike on a house in Gaza City’s Zeitoun neighbourhood. The death toll could rise as many people were trapped under the rubble, they added.

In Gaza City, an Israeli strike on a house in the suburb of Sabra killed eight more people, medics said, bringing Thursday's death toll to 21.

On Wednesday, Hamas and Israel traded blame over their failure to conclude a ceasefire agreement despite progress reported by both sides in past days.

Hamas said Israel had laid down further conditions, while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused the group of going back on understandings already reached.

“The occupation has set new conditions related to withdrawal, ceasefire, prisoners, and the return of the displaced, which has delayed reaching the agreement that was available,” Hamas said.

Netanyahu responded in a statement: “The Hamas terrorist organisation continues to lie, is reneging on understandings that have already been reached, and is continuing to create difficulties in the negotiations.”