The United Nations' Secretary-General condemned on Wednesday attacks on UN personnel and added in a statement from his spokesperson that all parties in Israel's incursion into Gaza knew where the UN's premises were based.
"The Secretary-General was deeply saddened and shocked to learn of the death of a United Nations Office for Project Services staff member, when two UN guesthouses in Deir al Balah were hit in strikes," a spokesperson for Secretary-General Antonio Guterres wrote.
"The locations of all UN premises are known to the parties to the conflict, who are bound by international law to protect them and maintain their absolute inviolability," the statement continued.
"The Secretary-General sends his deepest condolences to the family of the staff member killed," he said, adding that at least 280 UN staff had been killed in Gaza since Oct 7, 2023.
The UN then called for an investigation into an alleged strike on two UN guest houses in Gaza that killed one of its workers and injured five others.
UN says it's too early to assign blame
"The Secretary-General strongly condemns all attacks on UN personnel and calls for a full investigation," Deputy Spokesman for the Secretary-General Farhan Haq said at a news conference. "He underscores that all conflicts must be conducted in a way that ensures civilians are respected and protected."
Haq said it's too early to determine who is responsible for dropping or firing the explosive ordinance at the accommodation sites housing the workers.
"The locations of all UN premises are known to the parties to the conflict, who are bound by international law to protect them and maintain their absolute inviolability," the statement continued.
The Bulgarian Foreign Ministry said that a citizen from the country who was working for the UN was killed in the Gaza Strip, a Wednesday press statement read.
The ministry said further information will be made public after Bulgaria had been informed about the outcome of an investigation being carried out by the competent authorities into the circumstances surrounding the incident.
It was not immediately clear if the Bulgarian national was the foreign national that Gaza's health ministry said was killed in an alleged Israeli airstrike on the site of a UN headquarters in central Gaza City on Wednesday.
The UN's call for an investigation comes after a source informed The Jerusalem Post that the UN officials were harmed during an operation to clear landmines in the Gaza Strip.
The IDF said it "did not strike a UN compound in Deir el Balah," and called on media outlets to act with caution regarding unverified reports, the Post reported.
Early Tuesday morning, the IDF struck several Hamas targets in its first airstrike since the ceasefire began in January.
The IDF subsequently resumed its operations in Gaza and issued new orders for residents to evacuate combat zones.
Yonah Jeremy Bob and Mathilda Heller contributed to this report.