CAIRO/GAZA (Reuters) – An Israeli attack near an aid distribution point in Gaza killed as many as 31 Palestinians today, local health authorities said, as Hamas and Israel exchanged blame over a faltering effort to secure a ceasefire.
The incident in Rafah in the south of the enclave was the latest in a series underscoring the insecurity around aid delivery to Gaza, following the easing of an almost three-month Israeli blockade last month.
“There are martyrs and injuries. Many injuries. It is a tragic situation in this place. I advise them that nobody goes to aid delivery points. Enough,” paramedic Abu Tareq said at Nasser Hospital in nearby Khan Younis city.
The Palestinian Red Crescent, affiliated with the international Red Cross, said its medical teams had recovered the bodies of 23 Palestinians and treated another 23 injured people near the aid collection site in Rafah.
Local health authorities said at least 31 bodies had so far arrived at Nasser Hospital.
The U.S.-based Gaza Humanitarian Foundation operates the aid distribution sites in Rafah.
Israel’s military said in a statement it was looking into reports that Palestinians had been shot at an aid distribution site, but that it was unaware of injuries caused by military fire.
GHF denied anyone was killed or injured near its site in Rafah and said that all of its distribution had taken place without incident. It accused Palestinian militant group Hamas of fabricating “fake reports”.
GHF is a U.S.-based entity backed by the U.S. and Israeli governments that began providing humanitarian aid in Gaza last month, bypassing traditional aid groups.
The group has been widely criticised by the international community, with U.N. officials saying its aid plans would only foment forced relocation of Palestinians in Gaza and more violence.
Residents and medics said Israeli soldiers fired from the ground at a crane nearby that overlooks the area, and a tank opened fire at thousands of people who were en route to get aid from the site in Rafah. Reuters footage showed ambulance vehicles carrying injured people to Nasser Hospital.
The Hamas-run Gaza government media office accused Israel of using aid as a weapon, “employed to exploit starving civilians and forcibly gather them at exposed killing zones, which are managed and monitored by the Israeli military”.
Israel denies that people in Gaza are starving because of its actions, saying it is facilitating aid deliveries and pointing to its endorsement of the new GHF distribution centres and its consent for other aid trucks to enter Gaza.
It accuses Hamas of stealing supplies intended for civilians and using them to entrench its hold on Gaza. Hamas denies looting supplies and has executed a number of suspected looters.
Reda Abu Jazar said her brother was killed as he waited to collect food at the Rafah aid distribution centre. “Let them stop these massacres, stop this genocide. They are killing us,” she said, as Palestinian men gathered for funeral prayers.
The head of the U.N. Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA), Philippe Lazzarini, condemned the deaths on Sunday, saying in a statement on X that “aid distribution has become a death trap”. He said aid distribution should be “only through the United Nations including UNRWA”.
The Red Crescent also reported that 14 Palestinians were injured on Sunday by Israeli fire near a separate site in central Gaza. GHF also operates the aid distribution site in central Gaza.
CEASEFIRE TALKS FALTER
Israel and Hamas meanwhile traded blame for the faltering of a new Arab and U.S. mediation bid to secure a temporary ceasefire and the release of Israeli hostages held in Gaza by Hamas, in exchange for Palestinians in Israeli jails.
Hamas said on Saturday it was seeking amendments to a U.S.-backed ceasefire proposal, but President Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff rejected the group’s response as “totally unacceptable.”
Dozens of Palestinians marched on Sunday at the funeral of a Gaza doctor, Hamdi Al-Najjar, who was critically injured in late May in an airstrike that killed all but one of his 10 children. Najjar died late on Saturday.
The Israeli military has confirmed it conducted an air strike on Khan Younis that day, but said it was targeting suspects in a structure that was close to Israeli soldiers.
The military is looking into claims that “uninvolved civilians” were killed, it said, adding that the military had evacuated civilians from the area before the operation began.
Israel began its offensive in Gaza in response to the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023, which killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians, according to Israeli tallies, and saw 251 taken as hostages into Gaza.
Israel’s campaign has devastated much of Gaza, killing over 54,000 Palestinians and destroying most buildings. Much of the population now lives in shelters in makeshift camps.
