Deir al-Balah, Gaza Strip — At least 34 Palestinians were killed Monday in new shootings near food distribution centers run by a controversial Israeli- and U.S.-backed group in the south of the Gaza Strip, the Hamas-run Gaza Ministry of Health said. The toll was the deadliest yet in the near-daily shootings that have taken place as thousands of Palestinians move through Israeli military-controlled areas to try to reach the food “hubs” run by the private contractor Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.
Two witnesses said Israeli troops opened fire early Monday in an attempt to control the crowds. There was no immediate comment by the Israeli military. It has said after numerous previous instances that troops had fired warning shots at what it called suspect individuals approaching their positions.
Gaza’s Hamas-run Health Ministry said 33 Palestinians were killed trying to reach the GHF center near the southern city of Rafah on Monday while another was fatally shot trying to reach a GHF hub in central Gaza. It said four other people were killed elsewhere in the war-torn enclave.
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Two Palestinians trying to get food at the Rafah site, Heba Jouda and Mohammed Abed, told The Associated Press that Israeli forces fired on the crowds at around 4 a.m. at the Flag Roundabout. The traffic circle, hundreds of yards from the GHF center, has repeatedly been the scene of shootings. The military has designated specific routes to access the food centers, and GHF has warned aid-seekers that leaving the roads is dangerous, but many do in an attempt to get to the food first.
Israel and the United States say the new GHF system is needed to prevent Hamas from siphoning off aid. GHF says there has been no violence in or around the sites themselves. The funding for and management of GHF have remained unclear since it began operations in mid-May, but it is staffed by private, well-armed American security contractors.
U.N. agencies and major aid groups, which have delivered humanitarian aid across Gaza since the start of the 20-month Israel-Hamas war, have rejected the new system, saying it can’t meet the territory’s needs and allows Israel to use aid as a weapon. They deny there is widespread theft of aid by Hamas.
Philippe Lazzarini, the head of the U.N.’s agency for Palestinians, UNRWA, slammed GHF in a statement on Monday as a “lethal distribution system” and lamented that “tragedies go on unabated” in Gaza “while attention shifts elsewhere,” in an apparent reference to the new outbreak of significant fighting between Israel and Iran.
Israel launched surprise strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites and senior scientists and commanders late on Thursday, sparking an ongoing exchange of fire that the Israeli military says has killed at least two dozen civilians in the country, and reportedly hundreds in Iran.
“Scores of people have been killed & injured in the past days including of starving people trying to get some food from a lethal distribution system,” Lazzarini said in a social media post. “Restrictions on bringing in aid from the UN including @UNRWA continue despite an abundance of assistance ready to be moved into Gaza. In addition, severe shortages of fuel are now hampering the delivery of critical services especially health & water. Killings & wars will breed more wars & bloodshed. Civilians will always suffer first & suffer most.”
Israeli officials have repeatedly accused United Nations aid agencies of failing to collect and distribute food it allows into Gaza, a significant portion of which the Israeli military now controls and warns civilians to avoid due to its ongoing operations.
Palestinian health officials say scores of people have been killed and hundreds wounded since the GHF sites opened last month. Experts, including U.N. agency chiefs, have warned that Israel’s ongoing military campaign and restrictions on the entry of aid have put Gaza, which is home to more than 2 million Palestinians, at risk of famine.
