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A 15-year-old Palestinian student and an emergency first responder have been killed in Gaza City following an Israeli double-tap drone strike, highlighting the persistent violence that continues to undermine the United States-brokered ceasefire agreed between Israel and Hamas in October of last year.
The fatal incident occurred on Tuesday in the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood, an area located in the northern sector of Gaza City, when an Israeli drone launched an initial strike against a group of Palestinians. Following the attack, Israeli military authorities asserted that their forces had been targeting operatives affiliated with Hamas.
The initial explosion left Sharif Shadi Labad, a dedicated paramedic with the Palestinian Civil Defence, critically injured and fighting for his life amid the rubble of severely damaged buildings.
Video documentation shared by Palestinian sources and verified by Al Jazeera showed several local residents immediately running toward the scene to deliver emergency assistance to the wounded first responder. Moments later, a second drone flying above the area launched an additional munition directly at the rescue effort. The ordnance utilized in the follow-up strike is believed to have been a Mikholit, an Israeli-developed guided glide bomb.
The secondary explosion killed 15-year-old Mohammad Abdul Zinati, a schoolboy who had stepped forward to assist the stricken paramedic, while leaving several other bystanders wounded, according to the Palestinian news outlet Shehab News. The teenager’s father later explained that the boy was simply returning home from his school classes when he encountered the scene and attempted to help.
In verified footage recorded outside al-Shifa Hospital, Zinati's body was seen resting on the ground covered in a white shroud as his grieving father bid him an emotional farewell. The father wept while reciting verses from the Quran and repeating the traditional phrase in Arabic: “God is sufficient for me, and he is the best disposer of affairs.”
At the same time, emergency personnel and local community members conducted a funeral procession to honor Labad. Colleagues from the Palestinian Civil Defence carried the paramedic's body, which was wrapped in a white shroud atop a gurney, while displaying his photograph and chanting: “Oh martyr, rest, rest. We continue the struggle.”
The attack in Sheikh Radwan is part of a broader pattern of double-tap bombardments carried out during the military campaign in Gaza. This controversial military tactic involves striking a target once, pausing until emergency personnel and civilians arrive to assist survivors, and then conducting a second strike on the same coordinates to inflict further casualties.
The strategic motivations behind this practice were detailed in a joint investigation published in July of last year by Israeli publications +972 Magazine and Local Call. Based on testimonies from rescue teams, local witnesses, and five Israeli security sources, the report revealed that the military implemented double-tap operations to heighten the probability of killing an intended target.
According to the security sources cited in that investigation, the double-tap protocol is frequently deployed during imprecise air operations when military commanders are uncertain whether the primary target was present or successfully neutralized during the initial bombardment.
Previous instances of such attacks have produced severe humanitarian casualties. In August 2025, a double-tap assault struck a designated section of the Nasser Hospital in southern Gaza, resulting in the deaths of 20 people. Among those killed were multiple medical workers and six journalists, including Al Jazeera camera operator Mohammad Salama.
Tuesday’s deadly strike in Gaza City represents one of many continuous breaches of the diplomatic truce negotiated in October 2025. Since the announcement of that ceasefire agreement, at least 1,381 Palestinians have been killed and 4,757 others have suffered injuries during near-daily military assaults across the enclave.
These casualties add to the vast human toll recorded since the outbreak of the war in October 2023, during which at least 73,795 people have been killed and 174,869 wounded. On Wednesday, the Health Ministry in Gaza stated that six people had been killed and 71 injured across the besieged territory over the preceding 24-hour period alone.
Minors have suffered heavily throughout the conflict, with the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) reporting last month that more than 64,000 children were killed or injured in Gaza between October 7, 2023, and October 7, 2025.
Reflecting on the continued bloodshed, UNICEF Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa Edouard Beigbeder noted that any truce resulting in daily child fatalities is inadequate. He emphasized that with hundreds more young people suffering severe physical trauma, children across Gaza remain deprived of the safety they were promised.
The ongoing violence coincides with severe warnings from the Health Ministry, which announced on Wednesday that Gaza's medical system is teetering on the edge of total collapse due to strict Israeli limits on incoming fuel and medical supplies.
In response, health officials issued an urgent plea to the United Nations Security Council, the World Health Organization, and the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, demanding immediate international intervention to prevent further casualties from supply shortages. Meanwhile, Gaza's Civil Defence agency voiced alarm over deteriorating physical conditions across the strip after a structurally compromised building collapsed in Gaza City, killing at least 20 people, including women and children.
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