Israel’s military admitted on Saturday it had fired on ambulances in the Gaza Strip after identifying them as “suspicious vehicles”, with Hamas condemning it as a “war crime” that killed at least one person.

The incident took place last Sunday in the Tal al-Sultan neighbourhood in the southern city of Rafah, close to the Egyptian border.

Israeli troops launched an offensive there on 20 March, two days after the army resumed aerial bombardments of Gaza after an almost two-month-long truce. Attacks on medical staff, hospitals and ambulances are potential war crimes.