Do the bodies have bullet holes or were they trampled & run over by trucks? The actual wounds will demonstrate the facts of this situation.
Many were killed and injured after Israeli forces opened fire near an aid convoy. Starkly different accounts of what happened were offered.
The Gazan health authorities said that more than 100 people were killed and more than 700 injured in a “massacre.” The Israeli military said that Gazans had surrounded aid trucks and “looted the supplies.”
Thursday, February 29, 2024 11:03 AM ET
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2024/02/29/world/israel-hamas-war-gaza-news
Israeli forces opened fire on Thursday as a crowd gathered near a convoy of aid trucks in Gaza City in a chaotic scene where dozens were killed and injured, according to the official Palestinian Authority news agency and an Israeli official who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
The details of what happened were unclear,
with Palestinian and Israeli officials offering starkly different accounts.
The Gazan health authorities said that more than 100 people were killed and more than 700 injured in a “massacre.”
The official Palestinian Authority news agency, Wafa, reported that “Israeli tanks had opened fire with machine guns at thousands” waiting for aid to arrive.
The Israeli military said in two statements that Gazans had surrounded aid trucks and “looted the supplies.” As a result, dozens were “killed and injured from pushing, trampling and being run over by the trucks,” the military said. It did not directly address the Palestinian claims of machine gun fire and said it was investigating.
An Israeli official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity while the matter is still under investigation, said Israeli soldiers securing the passage of the aid convoy had opened fire after a crowd approached the forces in a manner that the military said posed a threat. The official did not indicate whether the military had fired at the crowd or in its vicinity.
Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza have become increasingly desperate for food as the United Nations and other relief groups struggle to deliver supplies amid Israel’s nearly five-month-old military offensive. Distribution has also been hampered by
a breakdown in law and order, with Gazans seizing food from trucks.
Such aid is absolutely critical for the more than two million residents of Gaza.
The territory has been under an almost complete siege since the war began on Oct. 7 with an attack on Israel led by Hamas, the armed Palestinian group that had long controlled Gaza. The United Nations recently warned that at least a quarter of Gaza’s population is “one step away from famine,” and the Gazan health ministry said on Wednesday that at least six children had died in the territory from dehydration and malnutrition.
The ministry said that the death tollat the site of the convoy on Thursday was expected to rise as wounded Palestinians arrived at Al-Shifa Hospital, where medical staff were “unable to deal with the volume and type of injuries” amid a lack of medical supplies and staff.
Wounded people were arriving at two other hospitals in the north as well, including Kamal Adwan Hospital, according to the hospital director.
Late last month,
a strike hit a crowd of people waiting for aid trucks in Gaza City, killing multiple people and injuring scores of others, Gazan health authorities said.
Palestinian leaders condemn the deaths of civilians gathered for food aid.
Palestinian leaders, Arab officials and international aid groups issued condemnations on Thursday after dozens of civilians were killed as Israeli forces opened fire in northern Gaza where people had gathered to collect food aid.
The Palestinian Authority, based in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, called the deaths a “heinous act” by Israeli forces and demanded that the international community, especially Israel’s chief ally the United States, intervene to stop Israel’s military offensive.
“The killing of this large number of innocent civilian victims who risked their livelihood is considered an integral part of the genocidal war committed by the occupation government against our people,” the Palestinian Authority’s presidency said in a statement.
The circumstances of what happened on Thursday morning remained unclear. Gazan officials said that Israeli tanks had opened fire with machine guns at a crowd of thousands who were waiting for food that has been increasingly scarce amid Israel’s military offensive in Gaza. An Israeli official said that the crowd had approached Israeli forces in a threatening manner, and that soldiers had opened fire.
An official with Hamas, the armed group at war with Israel in Gaza, accused Israel of targeting “masses of citizens” who were desperately seeking food “to suppress the hunger of their children,” and warned that the killings could derail talks aimed at reaching a cease-fire.
“We will not allow the path of negotiations, through which we seek to end the human suffering of our people that was created by the occupation, to be a cover for the enemy’s continued crimes against our people in the Gaza Strip,” the official, Izzat Al-Rishq, said in a statement on social media.
Saudi Arabia’s foreign ministry
denounced Israel for “the targeting of defenseless civilians” and urged the international community to “take a firm stance by obligating Israel to respect international humanitarian law.”
The Jordanian foreign minister
criticized what he called a “monstrous act” and urged world leaders to take greater action to protect Palestinians.
Oxfam, the international charity, said it was “appalled” by the reports of the incident. “Israel deliberately targeting civilians after starving them is a gross violation of international humanitarian laws and our humanity,” the group said.
B’tselem, an Israeli human rights advocacy group, said that Palestinians in Gaza were suffering because of “the humanitarian crisis Israel has intentionally created,” and that the large crowd had gathered because of desperation.
“Whether they were shot or trampled to death, intentionally opening fire at civilians is a severe violation of international law and constitutes a war crime,” the group said in a statement. “This is especially grave given a crowd of thousands begging for aid.”
Biden says the shooting will complicate cease-fire talks.
President Biden said on Thursday that while he was still learning details of the shooting that killed or wounded hundreds in northern Gaza, he thought the deaths could jeopardize efforts to reach a cease-fire agreement between Israel and Hamas.
Asked whether the shooting would complicate negotiations, Mr. Biden said, “I know it will.”
After saying earlier this week that
he hoped a cease-fire deal could be reached by next Monday, the president signaled that was unlikely, though he was trying to remain optimistic.
“Probably not by Monday, but I’m hopeful,” he told reporters before traveling to Brownsville, Texas, to make a rare visit to the country’s southern border.
