‘More than 30 killed' in shootings near Gaza aid centres
One witness claimed that soldiers started shooting 'indiscriminately' on a gathering in the al-Tina area of Khan Yunis, about two miles from a site run by the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), on Saturday morning.
A second incident of gunfire was reported in the Shakoush area northwest of Rafah, a few hundred yards from another GHF hub.
Israel's military said it was 'looking into' the claims. The GHF, which was formed to deliver aid to civilians with support from the Israeli army, has not yet commented on the latest reports but has previously disputed figures issued by the Hamas-led government and the UN.
Gaza's civil defence agency told the AFP news agency that 22 were killed in Khan Yunis and four in Rafah. Separate figures given by hospital officials at the Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis put the total number of deaths at 32, including 25 in Khan Yunis and seven in Rafah, the Associated Press reported.
'It was a massacre. The occupation opened fire at us indiscriminately,' Mahmoud Mokeimar told the Associated Press after the incident in Khan Younis.
Sanaa al-Jaberi, a 55-year-old woman, said: 'We shouted 'food, food', but they didn't talk to us. They just opened fire.'
Another witness, Abdul Aziz Abed, told AFP that he set off to the aid centre at dawn with five of his relatives to get food but was thwarted by the gunfire. 'Every day I go there and all we get is bullets and exhaustion instead of food,' he said.
Dr Mohamed Saker, the head of the Nasser hospital's nursing department, told the AP news agency that most of the dead and wounded were shot in their heads and chest. He described the situation at the hospital as 'difficult and tragic' due to the lack of medical supplies.
The UN said earlier this week that nearly 900 people had been killed trying to access aid in the six-week period since the GHF took charge of humanitarian aid in Gaza, including 674 at or around GHF sites.
That figure is disputed by the GHF, who have denied reports of innocent civilians being shot. On Wednesday the organisation admitted that 20 people were killed in a crowd surge at one aid site but blamed agitators affiliated with Hamas for causing the disaster.
The GHF said in a statement on Friday that it had successfully distributed 79 million meals since its foundation last May. It claimed its work had been 'made more difficult by a coordinated disinformation campaign led by Hamas' and blamed 'the amplification of those lies from the mainstream media and the United Nations'. Restrictions placed on media access make it difficult to independently verify details and death tolls provided by officials.
The Israeli military has acknowledged in the past that its troops had fired warning shots on 'suspicious' people and has blamed militants for provoking the violence. The Israeli government has also rejected allegations reported by the Haaretz newspaper that soldiers had been ordered to shoot at crowds if they arrived at the aid sites too early, too late, or in the wrong place.
More than 58,000 Palestinians have been killed since the start of the war, according to the Hamas-run health ministry. Hamas started the war in October 2023 by attacking Israel, killing more than 1,100 Israelis and kidnapping more than 200.
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