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At least 20 Palestinians have been killed in a crush at a food distribution site in southern Gaza run by the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. It happened after GHF guards used teargas or pepper spray on hungry crowds arriving at the centre, Palestinian health authorities and witnesses said.
Nineteen people were crushed and one stabbed in a “chaotic and dangerous surge” on Wednesday morning, GHF said in a statement. It did not respond to questions about the use of pepper spray or teargas by its staff at the site near Khan Younis.
Fifteen people died from suffocation after toxic gases were fired at the crowd, the Gaza health ministry said in a statement. The deaths marked a grim milestone for Palestinians in a war where Israeli attacks have already killed over 58,000 people, the majority of them civilians.
“This is the first time that deaths have been recorded due to suffocation and severe stampedes at aid distribution centres,” health authorities said.
At least 800 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces while trying to access food since the GHF began operations in late May, many of them trying to reach a GHF distribution site. The deaths on Wednesday were the first at a site controlled by the organisation’s armed security guards.
GHF, a startup organisation with no experience of distributing food in complex conflict zones, says it bears no responsibility for deaths outside its perimeters.
In one video posted on social media, which could not immediately be verified, a man described guards throwing teargas at crowds who were already out of breath from the race to get limited aid.
“I was running like everybody else to reach the gate [to the site),” he said. “People were crushing each other at the gate and they [the guards) started throwing teargas at us.”
GHF said it identified people with weapons in the crowd for the first time since starting operations, and confiscated one gun.
It claimed, without providing details or evidence, that people with Hamas links “fomented unrest”.
The organisation runs only four sites to feed 2 million people, in a territory where extreme hunger is widespread and food security experts have warned of looming famine.
Under the aid model run by the UN and major international humanitarian organisations, which fed Palestinians during nearly 20 months of war, there were over 400 aid distribution points used to bring food into communities.
Israeli authorities claimed they needed a new aid system because Hamas was diverting aid, but have not provided evidence to back up allegations that closely audited supply chains of UN and humanitarian agencies were compromised.
Food security experts say deaths are inevitable in a system with only four sites, which open for short, irregular periods, providing food for hundreds of thousands of desperately hungry people.
Malak A Tantesh, Sufian Taha and William Christou contributed reporting
