Injured survivors of Gaza aid chaos say Israeli forces shot at them

GAZA - Some Palestinians injured in a Gaza aid delivery disaster said on March 1 that Israeli forces shot them as they rushed to get food for their families, describing a scene of terror and chaos.

The health authorities in Hamas-run Gaza said

115 people were killed in the Feb 29 incident,

attributing the deaths to Israeli fire, and calling it a massacre.

The Israeli military said a “stampede” occurred when thousands of Gazans surrounded the aid convoy, leading to dozens of deaths and injuries, including some who were run over.

An Israeli source acknowledged that troops had opened fire on the crowd, believing it “posed a threat”.

Israeli armed forces spokesman Daniel Hagari said troops had fired “a few warning shots” to try to disperse a “mob” that had “ambushed” the aid lorries.

The incident underscored the collapse of orderly aid distribution in areas of Gaza occupied by Israeli forces, with no administration in place and the main United Nations agency, UNRWA, hamstrung by an inquiry into alleged links with Hamas.

On March 1, a UN team visited some of the wounded from the aid incident, in Gaza City’s Al-Shifa Hospital, and saw a “large number of gunshot wounds”, UN chief Antonio Guterres’ spokesman said.

Four witnesses, who spoke at the hospital in a video obtained by Reuters, said they were fired upon by Israeli forces, some describing tanks and armed drones being involved.

Mr Mahmoud Ahmad said he began waiting on the evening of Feb 28 for the convoy that eventually arrived the next morning, saying hunger forced him to take the risk of going to the delivery route in hopes of getting flour for his children.

As the aid lorries came into northern Gaza, he went towards them but, he said, a tank and a “quadcopter” drone began to fire. “I was injured in my back. I was bleeding for an hour until one of my relatives came and took me to hospital,” he said.

“When the aid entered, the tank and quadcopter started firing at the people gathered, the people who went to get food for themselves and their children. They started shooting at them,” he said.

Mr Jihad Mohammed said he was waiting at Nabulsi roundabout on the Al-Rashid coastal road, the main delivery route into northern Gaza from the south.

“We went and waited for the trucks, and then there was firing at all the people, and then I was injured,” he said.

Asked if he believed Israeli forces had fired on them deliberately, he said: “Yes, that is right. They used tanks, soldiers, aircraft... All were firing towards us.”

Mr Sami Mohammed was at the Al-Rashid road with his son waiting for the aid convoy to arrive. “My son ran to the beach, and they shot him twice... one grazed his head, and the other hit his chest,” he said. He said bullets and shells were fired.

The boy was lying in a hospital bed with bandages on his chest and arm, and a cut on his face.

Mr Abdallah Juha said he went to try to get a sack of flour for his parents. “We are very hungry. We don’t have food or anything. They fired at us... they squashed us,” he said, adding that the fire came from tanks.

Mr Juha, who had a bandage on his face, was injured in the head by a bullet. “My little brother cries because he wants to eat. Where should I get him food?” he said.

Divergent accounts

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said a UN team visited Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City on March 1 to deliver medical supplies and met people injured in the incident.

“By the time of the team’s visit, the hospital had also received the bodies of more than 70 people who had been killed,” it said.

An Israeli official said on Feb 29 that there had been two incidents, hundreds of metres apart. In the first, dozens were killed or injured as they tried to take aid from the lorries and were trampled or run over.

He said there was a second, subsequent incident as the lorries moved off. Some people in the crowd approached troops, who felt under threat and opened fire, killing an unknown number in a “limited response”, he said.

He dismissed the casualty toll given by the Gaza authorities, but gave no figure himself. REUTERS