CAIRO/GAZA (Reuters) -Israeli tanks fired into a crowd trying to get aid from trucks in the Gaza Strip on Monday, killing at least 51 people, according to medics, in one of the bloodiest incidents yet in mounting violence as desperate residents struggle for food.
Video shared on social media showed around a dozen mangled bodies lying in a street in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip. The Israeli military acknowledged firing in the area and said it was looking into the incident.
Eyewitnesses interviewed by Reuters said Israeli tanks had fired at least two shells at a crowd of thousands, who had gathered on the main eastern road through Khan Younis in the hope of getting food from aid trucks that use the route.
“All of a sudden, they let us move forward and made everyone gather, and then shells started falling, tank shells,” said Alaa, an eyewitness, interviewed by Reuters at Nasser Hospital, where wounded victims lay sprawled on the floor and in corridors due to the lack of space.
“No one is looking at these people with mercy. The people are dying, they are being torn apart, to get food for their children. Look at these people, all these people are torn to get flour to feed their children.”
Medics said at least 51 people were killed and 200 wounded, at least 20 of them in critical condition. Casualties were being rushed into the hospital in civilian cars, rickshaws, and donkey carts.
In a statement, the Israeli Defence Forces said: “Earlier today, a gathering was identified adjacent to an aid distribution truck that got stuck in the area of Khan Yunis, and in proximity to IDF troops operating in the area.
“The IDF is aware of reports regarding a number of injured individuals from IDF fire following the crowd’s approach. The details of the incident are under review. The IDF regrets any harm to uninvolved individuals and operates to minimise harm as much as possible to them while maintaining the safety of our troops.”
Medics said at least 14 other people were also killed in separate Israeli gunfire and airstrikes elsewhere in the enclave, taking Tuesday’s death toll to at least 65.
The incident was the latest in nearly daily mass killings of Palestinians seeking aid in the past three weeks, since Israel partially lifted a total blockade on the territory it had imposed for nearly three months.
Israel has been channelling much of the aid it is now allowing into Gaza through a new U.S.- and Israel-backed group, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which operates a handful of distribution sites in areas guarded by Israeli forces.
The United Nations rejects the system as inadequate, dangerous and a violation of humanitarian impartiality rules. Israel says it is needed to prevent Hamas fighters from diverting aid, which Hamas denies.
Gaza authorities say hundreds of Palestinians have been killed trying to reach the GHF’s sites, including 23 people killed by Israeli gunfire on Monday in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip.
The GHF said in a press release late on Monday that it had distributed more than three million meals at its four distribution sites without incident.
EYES ON IRAN WAR
The Gaza war was triggered in October 2023, when Palestinian Hamas militants attacked Israel, killing 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages, according to Israeli allies. Israel’s subsequent military assault on Gaza has killed nearly 55,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s health ministry, while displacing nearly the entire population of 2.3 million and causing a hunger crisis.
Since last week, residents of Gaza have kept an eye on war between Israel and Iran, which began with Israel launching major strikes on Friday. Iran has long been a major supporter of Hamas.
Residents of the Gaza Strip have circulated images of wrecked buildings in Israel hit by Iranian missiles, some openly happy to see Israelis experiencing a measure of the fear of air strikes that Gazans have endured for 20 months.
“We live these scenes and pain daily. We are very happy that we saw the day when we saw rubble in Tel Aviv, and they are trying to get out from under the rubble and the houses that were destroyed on top of their residents,” said Saad Saad, a Gaza man.
Said another, Taysseir Mohaissan: “The time has come for Iran to teach the Israeli occupation state a lesson.”
(Reporting and writing by Nidal al-Mughrabi. Additional reporting by Hatem Khaled, Hussam al-Masri, and Dawoud Abu Alkas in Gaza; Editing by Alex Richardson, William Maclean, Peter Graff)
By Nidal al-Mughrabi
