Israel said on Tuesday that an initial army investigation showed mortar fire may have come from a UN-run school in Gaza, where dozens of people were killed in an Israeli strike.
"The initial findings... are that there was hostile fire at one of our units from the UN facility," government spokesman Mark Regev told AFP.
"Our unit responded. Then, there were explosions out of proportion to the ordnance we used," he said. "And then you can only speculate as to why. We are still investigating."
Avital Liebovich, an army spokeswoman, said a mortar round may have been fired from inside the school, and that the subsequent explosions indicated the courtyard may have been booby-trapped.
"When you're being attacked during a war, you naturally return fire to the place of the attack," she told Al-Jazeera's English television channel. "That is how it is in a war."
Stressing that the army investigation was only preliminary, Regev said, "Of course you know... that it is not without precedent that terrorists have used UNRWA facilities," he said, adding, "We don't know if that's the case now, we're checking."
A strike near the Al-Fakhura school in Jabaliya in northern Gaza, where at least 40 people were killed, according to medics, was Israel’s third deadly attack near United Nations-run schools on Tuesday.
The Israeli military said it did not target civilians in its war on Hamas in Gaza, blaming the Islamists for the mounting civilian death toll.
"The IDF (Israel Defense Forces) emphasizes that the residents of Gaza are not the target of the operation," it said in a statement. "The IDF does all within its power to avoid injury to civilians."
The Israeli military accused Hamas of placing "many military installations, including weapons storage depots, in civilian areas.”
"Many of these have been in the homes of Hamas activists, together with their wives and children," it said.
"Hamas, which uses civilians, the elderly and children as 'human shields,' is responsible for any and all injury to the civilian population," the statement read.
Since Israel unleashed its war on Hamas in Gaza on December 27, at least 635 Palestinians have been killed and more than 2,900 wounded, according to Gaza medics. More than 160 of the dead are children, they say.
-AFP