Latest news with #TareqAbuAzzoum
Yahoo
4 days ago
- General
- Yahoo
UN demands probe as Israeli forces kill more people near aid site in Gaza
Israeli forces have opened fire again on Palestinians seeking humanitarian aid from a distribution site in Gaza, killing at least three people and injuring more than 30, as the United Nations demands an independent investigation into the repeated mass shootings of aid seekers in the strip. The shooting erupted at sunrise on Monday at the same Israeli-backed aid point in southern Gaza where soldiers had opened fire just a day earlier, according to health officials and witnesses. 'The Israeli military opened fire on civilians trying to get their hands on any kind of food aid without any kind of warning,' Al Jazeera's Tareq Abu Azzoum reported from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza. 'This is a pattern that's been widely condemned by international aid organisations because it enhances the breakdown of civil order without ensuring humanitarian relief can be received by those desperately in need.' Witnesses said Israeli snipers and quadcopter drones routinely monitor aid sites run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which is backed by Israel and the United States. A Red Cross field hospital received about 50 people wounded in the latest shooting, including two who were dead on arrival, said Hisham Mhanna, a spokesperson for the International Committee of the Red Cross. Most had been hit by bullets or shrapnel. A third body was taken to Nasser Hospital in nearby Khan Younis. Moataz al-Feirani, 21, said he was shot in the leg while walking with thousands of others towards the food site. 'We had nothing, and they [the Israeli military] were watching us,' he told The Associated Press news agency, adding that surveillance drones circled overhead. The shooting began about 5:30am (02:30 GMT) near the Flag Roundabout, he said. The pattern of deadly violence around the GHF aid distribution site has triggered mounting international outrage, and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Monday demanded an independent inquiry into the mass shooting of Palestinians. 'It is unacceptable that Palestinians are risking their lives for food,' he said. 'I call for an immediate and independent investigation into these events and for perpetrators to be held accountable.' The Israeli military has denied targeting civilians, claiming its soldiers fired 'warning shots' at individuals who 'posed a threat'. The GHF has also denied the shootings occurred although doubts about its neutrality have intensified since its founding executive director, former US marine Jake Wood, resigned before operations even began after he questioned the group's 'impartiality' and 'independence'. Critics said the group functions as a cover for Israel's broader campaign to depopulate northern Gaza as it concentrates aid in the south while bypassing established international agencies. Aid is still barely trickling into Gaza after Israel partially lifted a total siege that for more than two months cut off food, water, fuel and medicine to more than two million people. Thousands of children are at risk of dying from hunger-related causes, the UN has previously warned. Elsewhere in the territory, Israeli air attacks continued to hammer residential areas. In Jabalia in northern Gaza, Israeli forces killed 14 people, including seven children, in an attack on a home, according to the Palestinian Civil Defence agency. At least 20 people remained trapped under the rubble. Two more Palestinians were killed and several wounded in another attack in Deir el-Balah, according to the Palestinian news agency Wafa, while a drone attack in Khan Younis claimed yet another life. Gaza's Ministry of Health reported that at least 51 Palestinians have been killed and 503 injured in Israeli attacks across the territory in the latest 24-hour reporting period alone. Despite growing international condemnation, Israel's military on Monday ordered the displacement of even more civilians from parts of Khan Younis, warning it would 'operate with great force'. Roughly 80 percent of the strip is now either under Israeli military control or designated for forced evacuation, according to new data from the Financial Times, as Gaza's 2.3 million residents are crammed into an ever-shrinking patch of land in southern Gaza near the Egyptian border. Israel has made little secret of its aim to permanently displace Gaza's population as officials openly promote 'voluntary migration' plans. The Financial Times reported that the areas Palestinians are being pushed into resemble a 'desert wasteland with no running water, electricity or even hospitals'. Satellite images showed Israeli forces clearing land and setting up military infrastructure in evacuated areas. Analysts who reviewed dozens of recent forced evacuation orders said the trend has accelerated since the collapse of a truce in March. 'The Israeli government has been very clear with regards to what their plan is about in Gaza,' political analyst Xavier Abu Eid told Al Jazeera. 'It is about ethnic cleansing.'
Qatar Tribune
29-05-2025
- Health
- Qatar Tribune
Israeli attacks kill over 60 in Gaza as hunger crisis deepens
Agencies Gaza Israeli attacks have killed at least 64 people across Gaza, the Health Ministry said, as starving Palestinians struggle to access the limited amount of aid supplies that have entered the coastal enclave. At least 23 people were killed on Thursday in a series of Israeli attacks on residential buildings in the Bureij refugee camp, central Gaza, according to Gaza's civil defence. Reporting from Deir el-Balah, Al Jazeera's Tareq Abu Azzoum said casualties from the Bureij attack were transported to al-Awda Hospital and Al-Aqsa Hospital. 'There has been a state of alert in the emergency department as emergency services said they spent at least 30 minutes recovering casualties from the site of the strike,' Azzoum said. At least seven people were killed in strikes on a kindergarten and a home belonging to the Azzam family in Jabalia, northern Gaza, the official Palestinian news agency Wafa reported. Later on Thursday, multiple explosions were reported near a newly opened aid distribution point, run by the previously unknown United States-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), at the Netzarim Corridor in central Gaza. It was not immediately clear what caused the blasts and there were no immediate reports of casualties. The explosions came after 10 people were killed when Israeli forces shot at Palestinians seeking aid at another GHF site in southern Gaza in separate incidents on Tuesday and Wednesday, Gaza's Government Media Office said. Dozens of people were injured when thousands of hungry Palestinians rushed the GHF site in the first incident on Tuesday. The GHF has been accused of helping Israel fulfil its military objectives, while excluding Palestinians, bypassing the United Nations system and failing to adhere to humanitarian principles. The UN and other international aid groups have boycotted the foundation, which they said undermines the principle that humanitarian aid should be distributed independently of the parties to a conflict and based on need. 'This new scheme is surveillance-based rationing that legitimises a policy of deprivation by design,' senior UN aid official for the occupied Palestinian territory, Jonathan Whittall, told reporters in Jerusalem. 'The UN has refused to participate in this scheme, warning that it is logistically unworkable and violates humanitarian principles by using aid as a tool in Israel's broader efforts to depopulate areas of Gaza,' he said. Israel's ambassador to the UN Danny Danon told the Security Council on Wednesday that Israel would allow aid deliveries 'for the immediate future' via both the UN and the GHF. Danon said the UN should 'put their ego aside and cooperate with the new mechanism'. According to the foundation, it handed out the equivalent of 840,262 meals on Tuesday and Wednesday. In a separate incident on Wednesday, the World Food Programme said 'hordes of hungry people' broke into the al-Ghafari warehouse in Deir el-Balah, central Gaza, looking for food supplies. 'Initial reports indicate two people died and several were injured in the tragic incident,' WFP said in a statement on X, adding that it was still confirming details. After ending an 11-week blockade last week following growing international pressure, Israel has allowed limited humanitarian supplies to be delivered, but aid groups have warned that the amount is not nearly enough. Sigrid Kaag, the UN's special coordinator for the Middle East peace process, told the Security Council that the amount of aid Israel had so far allowed the UN to deliver was 'comparable to a lifeboat after the ship has sunk' when everyone in Gaza was facing the risk of famine.
Yahoo
21-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Israeli attacks kill 52 in Gaza as NGO slams ‘ridiculously inadequate aid'
At least 52 people have been killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza, medical sources told Al Jazeera, as pressure mounts on Tel Aviv to allow significant humanitarian aid into the besieged enclave to avert a looming famine. Israeli air strikes and tank fire continued to pound the besieged territory on Wednesday. Among those killed were at least eight people in Gaza City, two people in central Gaza's Nuseirat camp and two people in the Maghazi camp in central Gaza, according to Al Jazeera reporters in Gaza. The attacks come after Israel began allowing dozens of humanitarian trucks into Gaza on Tuesday, but the aid has not yet reached Palestinians in desperate need. Jens Laerke, the spokesperson for the UN's humanitarian agency, said no trucks were picked up from the Gaza side of Karem Abu Salem crossing, known as Kerem Shalom to Israelis, in southern Gaza. Israel announced that 93 aid trucks had entered Gaza from Israel following an 11-week blockade. Reporting from Deir el-Balah, central Gaza, Al Jazeera's Tareq Abu Azzoum explained that most of those trucks had only received military clearance to enter the Palestinian side of the crossing. 'They are still stuck at the border crossing. Only five trucks have made it in,' Abu Azzoum said, adding, 'This could be another sign of the systematic obstruction of aid in Gaza.' Aid groups have said that the amount of aid that Israel is allowing is not nearly enough, calling Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's efforts a 'smokescreen to pretend the siege is over'. 'The Israeli authorities' decision to allow a ridiculously inadequate amount of aid into Gaza after months of an air-tight siege signals their intention to avoid the accusation of starving people in Gaza, while, in fact, keeping them barely surviving,' said Pascale Coissard, the emergency coordinator in Khan Younis for Doctors Without Borders, known by its French acronym MSF. The Israeli military body that oversees humanitarian aid to Gaza said trucks were entering Gaza on Wednesday morning, but it was unclear if that aid would be able to continue deeper into Gaza for distribution. A few dozen Israeli activists opposed to Israel's decision to allow aid into Gaza while Hamas still holds Israeli hostages attempted to block the trucks carrying the aid on Wednesday morning, but were kept back by Israeli police. Israel is facing growing international pressure over its renewed offensive on Gaza. The United Kingdom has suspended talks with Israel on a free trade deal, and the European Union said it will review a pact on political and economic ties over the 'catastrophic situation' in Gaza. Britain, France and Canada have threatened 'concrete actions' if Israel continues its offensive. Pope Leo on Wednesday also appealed for Israel to allow humanitarian aid to enter Gaza. 'I renew my fervent appeal to allow for the entry of fair humanitarian help and to bring to an end the hostilities, the devastating price of which is paid by children, the elderly and the sick,' the pope said during his weekly general audience in Saint Peter's Square. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Wednesday urged world leaders to take immediate action to end Israel's siege on Gaza, issuing the appeal in a written statement during a visit to Beirut, where he is expected to discuss the disarmament of Palestinian factions in Lebanon's refugee camps. 'I call on world leaders to take urgent and decisive measures to break the siege on our people in the Gaza Strip,' Abbas said, demanding the immediate entry of aid, an end to the Israeli offensive, the release of detainees and a full withdrawal from Gaza. 'It is time to end the war of extermination against the Palestinian people. I reiterate that we will not leave, and we will remain here on the land of our homeland, Palestine,' Abbas said. Since the war began in October 2023 following the Hamas attack that killed 1,139 people in southern Israel, Israeli attacks on Gaza have killed 53,573 people and wounded 121,688 others.
Yahoo
21-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Israeli attacks kill 52 in Gaza as NGO slams ‘ridiculously inadequate aid'
At least 52 people have been killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza, medical sources told Al Jazeera, as pressure mounts on Tel Aviv to allow significant humanitarian aid into the besieged enclave to avert a looming famine. Israeli air strikes and tank fire continued to pound the besieged territory on Wednesday. Among those killed were at least eight people in Gaza City, two people in central Gaza's Nuseirat camp and two people in the Maghazi camp in central Gaza, according to Al Jazeera reporters in Gaza. The attacks come after Israel began allowing dozens of humanitarian trucks into Gaza on Tuesday, but the aid has not yet reached Palestinians in desperate need. Jens Laerke, the spokesperson for the UN's humanitarian agency, said no trucks were picked up from the Gaza side of Karem Abu Salem crossing, known as Kerem Shalom to Israelis, in southern Gaza. Israel announced that 93 aid trucks had entered Gaza from Israel following an 11-week blockade. Reporting from Deir el-Balah, central Gaza, Al Jazeera's Tareq Abu Azzoum explained that most of those trucks had only received military clearance to enter the Palestinian side of the crossing. 'They are still stuck at the border crossing. Only five trucks have made it in,' Abu Azzoum said, adding, 'This could be another sign of the systematic obstruction of aid in Gaza.' Aid groups have said that the amount of aid that Israel is allowing is not nearly enough, calling Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's efforts a 'smokescreen to pretend the siege is over'. 'The Israeli authorities' decision to allow a ridiculously inadequate amount of aid into Gaza after months of an air-tight siege signals their intention to avoid the accusation of starving people in Gaza, while, in fact, keeping them barely surviving,' said Pascale Coissard, the emergency coordinator in Khan Younis for Doctors Without Borders, known by its French acronym MSF. The Israeli military body that oversees humanitarian aid to Gaza said trucks were entering Gaza on Wednesday morning, but it was unclear if that aid would be able to continue deeper into Gaza for distribution. A few dozen Israeli activists opposed to Israel's decision to allow aid into Gaza while Hamas still holds Israeli hostages attempted to block the trucks carrying the aid on Wednesday morning, but were kept back by Israeli police. Israel is facing growing international pressure over its renewed offensive on Gaza. The United Kingdom has suspended talks with Israel on a free trade deal, and the European Union said it will review a pact on political and economic ties over the 'catastrophic situation' in Gaza. Britain, France and Canada have threatened 'concrete actions' if Israel continues its offensive. Pope Leo on Wednesday also appealed for Israel to allow humanitarian aid to enter Gaza. 'I renew my fervent appeal to allow for the entry of fair humanitarian help and to bring to an end the hostilities, the devastating price of which is paid by children, the elderly and the sick,' the pope said during his weekly general audience in Saint Peter's Square. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Wednesday urged world leaders to take immediate action to end Israel's siege on Gaza, issuing the appeal in a written statement during a visit to Beirut, where he is expected to discuss the disarmament of Palestinian factions in Lebanon's refugee camps. 'I call on world leaders to take urgent and decisive measures to break the siege on our people in the Gaza Strip,' Abbas said, demanding the immediate entry of aid, an end to the Israeli offensive, the release of detainees and a full withdrawal from Gaza. 'It is time to end the war of extermination against the Palestinian people. I reiterate that we will not leave, and we will remain here on the land of our homeland, Palestine,' Abbas said. Since the war began in October 2023 following the Hamas attack that killed 1,139 people in southern Israel, Israeli attacks on Gaza have killed 53,573 people and wounded 121,688 others.
Qatar Tribune
15-05-2025
- Health
- Qatar Tribune
Israel kills over 100 people in Gaza as Palestinians mark 77 years since Nakba
agencies Gaza At least 115 Palestinians, mostly women and children, have been killed in a wave of Israeli attacks across the Gaza Strip, as indirect ceasefire talks between Israel and Hamas continue. At least 61 people were killed overnight and early on Thursday in a barrage of attacks on the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, according to local health officials. In Jabalia in northern Gaza, an Israeli strike on Al-Tawba medical clinic killed at least 15 people and wounded several others, the health ministry said. Israel's army also attacked three hospitals in north and south Gaza: Al Awda hospital in Jabalia, the Indonesian Hospital in Khan Younis, and the European hospital, which Gaza's health ministry says is now out of service. Al Jazeera's Tareq Abu Azzoum, reporting from Deir el-Balah, described 'another bloody day' in Gaza, as Israel intensified its air attacks on residential areas. 'Israeli warplanes directly targeted nine houses without any warning in the city of Khan Younis,' he said, adding that entire families were 'completely wiped out'. He described the situation as chaotic, with civilians fleeing repeated forced evacuation orders. 'The Israeli military targeted civilians while they were asleep,' launching 13 air raids on the Jabalia refugee camp and nearby areas. Civil defence teams, he added, were overwhelmed and struggling to rescue those trapped under the rubble, due to a lack of equipment. Abu Azzoum said the strikes reflect a 'pattern of attacks not aimed at military targets, but at systematically destroying Gaza's social fabric'. Hamas said in a statement that Israel was making a 'desperate attempt to negotiate under cover of fire' as indirect ceasefire talks take place between Israel and Hamas, involving US envoys and Qatar and Egyptian mediators in Doha. The latest killings come amid new waves of forced displacement. Thousands fled Gaza City on Thursday after the Israeli military issued forced evacuation orders the day before. Al Jazeera's Hani Mahmoud reported scenes of panic and fear as residents packed their belongings and tried to escape the expected onslaught. 'We're seeing families carrying their belongings and taking to the streets,' Mahmoud said. 'The children and elderly are carrying whatever they're able to carry … They don't know where to go. There is no safe place for these people – the so-called shelters have already been destroyed by Israeli bombs.' Speaking to Al Jazeera, displaced Palestinian Hasan Moqbel described the continuing assault as a war on civilians. 'They have been bombing Gaza for 19 months. What's left in Gaza? Innocent children are dying. There is no armed activity here. Most of them are elderly people who are dying,' he said. The attacks come as Palestinians mark the 77th anniversary of the Nakba, or catastrophe, when more than 750,000 Palestinians were forcibly expelled by Zionist paramilitary groups during the creation of Israel in 1948. Regarding the wider mood in Gaza on Nakba Day, Abu Azzoum said people were 'deeply worried' about a potential expansion of Israeli ground operations. 'They believe the Israeli army may force them to flee again – to new areas where conditions are even worse.' Despite international diplomacy, 'there is no sign of a slowdown on the ground,' he warned. The US special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, spoke to Al Jazeera's diplomatic editor James Bays this week and 'painted a positive picture on a deal on Gaza', with a potential agreement being reached 'pretty soon'. When asked whether Witkoff was referring only to aid access – given that aid is currently completely blocked for the people of Gaza, with no food or medicine getting in – or to a ceasefire, he replied, 'all of it, I'm positive about all that'.
