The French military intelligence directorate (DRM) indicated on Friday that a blast at a hospital in Gaza was most likely the consequence of a Palestinian rocket that misfired rather than an Israeli missile attack.
According to Palestinian sources, the explosion at Al-Ahli al-Arabi Hospital on Tuesday claimed 471 lives. Israel claimed that a botched rocket launch by terrorists was the source of the explosion; however Gaza’s health ministry attributed the blast to an Israeli airstrike.
According to an unclassified US intelligence analysis, Israel was not the explosion’s cause and between 100 and 300 people were killed.
The impact crater was too tiny, according to the DRM, to have been created by an Israeli missile. “There is nothing that allows us to say that it is an Israeli strike, but the most likely (scenario) is a Palestinian rocket that had a firing incident,” it said.
Normally, the DRM would not provide such material, but in light of the divergent claims over who is at fault, it did so at President Emmanuel Macron’s request.
It eliminated a number of possibilities, such as the involvement of intercepted missiles or pieces of Israel’s Iron Dome air defence system.
A portion of the study was derived from publicly available data, which included the hospital’s little structural damage, which included a few damaged windows and a few totaled cars, as well as the comparatively small amount of civilian property that was found near the explosion site.
The DRM did not assign culpability to any particular party and was unable to pinpoint the precise point at when the failed rocket left the ground.
Although it could not provide an exact number of deaths, it stated that considering the effect, it was probably less than 471.
Israel has vowed to destroy Hamas in retaliation for an attack on October 7 that claimed the lives of 1,400 Israelis, placing the 2.3 million residents of Gaza under blockade. Over 4,100 people have died and over a million have been rendered homeless as a result of strikes against the enclave.
A ground attack is also being planned by Israel.
