Israel denies firing at civilians after Hamas-run health ministry claimed 31 Palestinians were killed on way to aid centre in Gaza

Daily Mail​

2 days ago

Israel has denied an attack on civilians near a Gaza aid centre as 31 were killed and more than 170 people were injured.
The Palestinians were on their way to receive food at the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation hub - a new aid organisation backed by Israel and the US - according to health officials and multiple witnesses.
The witnesses said Israeli tanks opened fire on crowds around 1,000 yards from the new aid site.
It was the deadliest incident yet around the new aid distribution system, which has operated for less than a week.
The Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) strongly denied the attack was against Palestinians and urged people not to believe 'rumours' and 'fake news '.
Spokesperson BG Effie Defrin said in a video posted on X: 'I'm here in the city of Rafah. So far we have opened four distribution centres.
'We have already distributed over 16,000 packages of food to the people. Hamas is doing its best to stop us from doing so. It is spreading rumours and fake news. I urge you not to believe every rumour spread by Hamas. We will investigate every one of those incidents.'
Israel's military said that its forces did not fire at civilians near or within the site, adding troops fired warning shots at several suspects advancing towards them a kilometre from the site.
'I urge you not believe every rumor spread by Hamas.'
IDF Spokesperson BG Effie Defrin directly from Rafah, on the humanitarian aid situation: https://t.co/pCTmy3KFeF
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) June 1, 2025
The health ministry said in a statement it delivered aid 'without incident' and dismissed what it described as 'false reporting about deaths, mass injuries and chaos'.
It has denied previous accounts of chaos and gunfire around its sites, which are in Israeli military zones where independent media has no access.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said its field hospital in the southern city of Rafah received 179 casualties including women and children, 21 of them declared dead upon arrival, the majority with gunshot or shrapnel wounds.
'All patients said they had been trying to reach an aid distribution site,' the ICRC said, calling it the highest number of 'weapon-wounded' people in a single incident since the hospital was set up more than a year ago.
'Aid distribution has become a death trap,' the head of the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees, Philippe Lazzarini, said in a statement.
Multiple witnesses have said Israeli troops fired on crowds near the new Gaza Humanitarian Foundation's sites.
Before today, 17 people were killed while trying to reach the sites, according to Zaher al-Waheidi, head of the Health Ministry's records department.
The foundation says private security contractors guarding its sites have not fired on the crowds. Israel's military has acknowledged firing warning shots on previous occasions.
UN agencies and major aid groups have refused to work with the new system, saying it violates humanitarian principles.
Thousands of people headed towards the distribution site in southern Gaza hours before dawn. As they approached, Israeli forces ordered them to disperse and come back later, witnesses said.
When the crowds reached the Flag Roundabout, around 1km away, at around 3am, Israeli forces opened fire, the witnesses said.
'There was fire from all directions, from naval warships, from tanks and drones,' said Amr Abu Teiba, who was in the crowd.
He said he saw at least 10 bodies with gunshot wounds and several other wounded people, including women. People used carts to ferry the dead and wounded to a field hospital.
'The scene was horrible,' he said.
Most people were shot 'in the upper part of their bodies, including the head, neck and chest,' said Dr Marwan al-Hams, a health ministry official at Nasser Hospital, where many wounded were transferred from the Red Cross-run field hospital.
He said 24 people were being treated in Nasser Hospital's intensive care unit. A colleague, surgeon Khaled al-Ser, later said 150 wounded people had arrived, along with 28 bodies.
Ibrahim Abu Saoud, another witness, said the military fired from about 300 metres away. He said he saw many people with gunshot wounds, including a young man who died at the scene.
'We weren't able to help him,' he said.
Mohammed Abu Teaima, 33, said he saw Israeli forces open fire and kill his cousin and a woman as they headed towards the distribution site. He said his cousin was shot in his chest, and his brother-in-law was among the wounded.
'They opened heavy fire directly toward us,' he said.
A reporter arrived at the field hospital at around 6am and saw dozens of wounded, including women and children. The witness also saw crowds of people returning from the distribution point. Some carried boxes of aid but most appeared to be empty-handed.
Gaza's Health Ministry said at least 31 people were killed and more than 170 were wounded.
UN agencies and major aid groups have refused to work with the new system, saying it violates humanitarian principles because it allows Israel to control who receives aid and forces people to relocate to distribution sites, risking yet more mass displacement in the coastal territory.
'It's essentially engineered scarcity,' Jonathan Whittall, interim head in Gaza of the UN humanitarian office, said last week.
The UN system has struggled to bring in aid after Israel slightly eased its nearly three-month blockade of the territory last month.
The groups say Israeli restrictions, the breakdown of law and order and widespread looting make it extremely difficult to deliver aid to Gaza's roughly two million Palestinians.
Experts have warned that the territory is at risk of famine if more aid is not brought in.
Israel's military campaign has killed more than 54,000 people, mostly women and children, according to Gaza's Health Ministry, which does not say how many of the dead were civilians or combatants.
The latest efforts at ceasefire talks appeared to stumble on Saturday when Hamas said it had sought amendments to a US ceasefire proposal that Israel had approved, and the US envoy called that 'unacceptable'.