logo
Israeli forces kill 92 aid seekers in Gaza

Israeli forces kill 92 aid seekers in Gaza

Qatar Tribune5 days ago
Agencies
Tel Aviv
At least 115 people, including 92 aid seekers, were killed by Israeli attacks across Gaza. More than 200 people wounded. Two more Palestinians, including a 35-day-old infant, have died of malnutrition at Gaza City's al-Shifa Hospital.
Local health authorities reported 67 Palestinians were killed by Israeli gunfire in northern Gaza in the morning alone.
The victims had been unarmed, the outlet reported, citing eyewitnesses.
Many bodies were still lying on the streets in the north-west of Gaza City.
According to several reports, people had been waiting near a border crossing to Israel for trucks carrying aid supplies.
A further two people were killed near the Al-Shakoush aid distribution point to the north of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, WAFA reported.
The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), the controversial agency backed by Israel and the United States as a substitute for UN-organized aid operations, maintains a distribution point to the north of Rafah, according to Palestinian reports.
There was no statement from the GHF.
UN and other aid organizations report catastrophic conditions in the Gaza Strip, whose almost 2 million residents are almost entirely dependent on aid to survive following almost 22 months of fighting between Israel and Palestinian extremist group Hamas.
According to UN figures, hundreds have died in the vicinity of aid distribution points and around aid convoys since the end of May.
Footage shows dead bodies Footage shared on Palestinian and social media shows several bodies following Israeli shelling in the north-west of Gaza City. A dead boy and his distraught relatives can also be seen. The authenticity of the footage and the reports could not initially be independently verified.
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

Death toll from starvation in Gaza rises to 115 as Israeli attacks continue
Death toll from starvation in Gaza rises to 115 as Israeli attacks continue

Al Jazeera

time18 hours ago

  • Al Jazeera

Death toll from starvation in Gaza rises to 115 as Israeli attacks continue

At least 62 people have been killed, including 19 who were seeking aid, in Israeli attacks across Gaza, hospital sources told Al Jazeera, and two people died from malnutrition amid growing international outrage over Israel's conduct in the war. Gaza's Health Ministry said on Thursday that at least 115 Palestinians have starved to death in the enclave since Israel launched its war on Gaza in October 2023. Most of the deaths, which include many children, have been in recent weeks. Israel imposed a total blockade on Gaza in March and has only allowed a trickle of aid into the territory since late May, triggering a dire humanitarian crisis and warnings of mass starvation. In a statement on Thursday, the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) warned that 'families are breaking down' amid the hunger crisis. 'Parents are too hungry to care for their children,' agency head Philippe Lazzarini said in a post on X. 'Those who reach UNRWA clinics don't have the energy, food or means to follow medical advice'. The UN humanitarian agency, OCHA, added that Israel has been preventing it from verifying aid waiting at distribution centres. Reporting from Gaza City, Al Jazeera's Hani Mahmoud said the situation was deteriorating, with Palestinians clamouring for any aid they can find. 'Enforced starvation, enforced dehydration, and hunger are gripping the Gaza Strip, with more people reported with malnutrition and a severe, acute shortage of food supplies and other basic necessities,' he said. 'According to what we hear from health sources, people's immune systems are falling apart. They're unable to fight the many diseases that are spreading because their bodies are unable to fight,' he said. With dire conditions on the ground largely unchanged, international condemnation has continued to grow. On Thursday, more than 60 members of the European Parliament (MEPs) demanded an emergency meeting to push actions against Israel in a letter sent to European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas. Speaking to Al Jazeera, Lynn Boylan, an Irish member of the European Parliament, accused EU leaders of a double standard when it comes to Palestinian lives. 'Clearly, Palestinian lives are not seen by the elite in the EU as equivalent to, for example, Ukrainian lives,' Boylan told Al Jazeera. 'There's a chilling effect, that if you dare to speak up against Israel, if you dare to call out the war crimes that you're witnessing, there is immediately a backlash and an attack,' she said. Outrage among European leaders has also soared in recent days, with 28 countries earlier this week condemning the aid blockade, while calling for an immediate end to the fighting. On Thursday, the United Kingdom's government announced Prime Minister Keir Starmer would hold a call with his German and French counterparts, to 'discuss what we can do urgently to stop the killing and get people the food they desperately need'. Breakdown in talks As the humanitarian situation in Gaza continues to spiral, negotiations to end the war again broke down, with US envoy Steve Witkoff announcing that his team was leaving negotiations in Qatar early. That came shortly after Israel announced it was withdrawing its delegation from the talks. In a statement, Witkoff accused Hamas of showing 'a lack of desire to reach a ceasefire'. 'We will now consider alternative options to bring the hostages home and try to create a more stable environment for the people of Gaza,' Witkoff said, without elaborating. Hamas, which has repeatedly accused Israel of blocking a ceasefire agreement, said it was surprised by Witkoff's remarks. 'The movement affirms its keenness to continue negotiations and engage in them in a manner that helps overcome obstacles and leads to a permanent ceasefire agreement,' said Hamas in a statement released late on Thursday. US President Donald Trump, meanwhile, has continued to push for a deal, while simultaneously supporting the displacement of Palestinians from the enclave to nearby countries, in what would potentially constitute ethnic cleansing. France to recognise Palestine Late on Thursday, French President Emmanuel Macron announced he would officially recognise the State of Palestine at the United Nations General Assembly in September. Macron said the decision was 'in keeping with [France's] historic commitment to a just and lasting peace in the Middle East'. The move will make France the largest and arguably most influential country in Europe to recognise a Palestinian state. The move was hailed by the deputy of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, who said it showed France's 'commitment to international law and its support for the Palestinian people's rights to self-determination and the establishment of our independent state'. Israeli officials swiftly condemned the move, with Defence Minister Israel Katz calling it a 'disgrace and a surrender to terrorism'. 'We will not allow the establishment of a Palestinian entity that would harm our security, endanger our existence, and undermine our historical right to the Land of Israel,' he said.

Hunger crisis deepens in Gaza as 10 more starvation deaths reported
Hunger crisis deepens in Gaza as 10 more starvation deaths reported

Qatar Tribune

time20 hours ago

  • Qatar Tribune

Hunger crisis deepens in Gaza as 10 more starvation deaths reported

At least 10 more Palestinians have starved to death in the besieged Gaza Strip, health officials say, as a wave of hunger crashes over the enclave. The latest starvation deaths bring the death toll from malnutrition since Israel's war began in October 2023 to 111, most of them in recent weeks. At least 100 other Palestinians, including 34 aid seekers, were killed in Israeli attacks over the past 24 hours, Gaza's Ministry of Health said on Wednesday. The World Health Organization (WHO) said that 21 children under the age of five were among those who died of malnutrition so far this year. It said it had been unable to deliver any food for nearly 80 days, between March and May, and that a resumption of food deliveries was still far below what is needed. In a statement, 111 organisations, including Mercy Corps, the Norwegian Refugee Council and Refugees International, said that 'mass starvation' was spreading even as tonnes of food, clean water and medical supplies sit untouched just outside Gaza, where aid groups are blocked from accessing them. Al Jazeera's Tareq Abu Azzoum, reporting from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, said that 'hunger has become as deadly as the bombs. Families are no longer asking for enough, they are asking for anything'. (Agencies)

WHO warns of ‘surge' in malnutrition deaths in Gaza
WHO warns of ‘surge' in malnutrition deaths in Gaza

Qatar Tribune

time2 days ago

  • Qatar Tribune

WHO warns of ‘surge' in malnutrition deaths in Gaza

dpa Geneva The World Health Organization (WHO) has warned against a deadly hunger crisis in the Gaza Strip, with the agency's chief stressing on Wednesday that famine was 'another killer' facing civilians, who report of horrifying conditions in the coastal area. 'The 2.1 million people trapped in the war zone that is Gaza are facing yet another killer on top of bombs and bullets: starvation,' Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in Geneva. 'We are witnessing a daily surge in malnutrition-related death,' he added. 'Since July 17, severe acute malnutrition centres are full without sufficient supplies for emergency feeding,' the WHO chief said, adding that the agency had documented the deaths of 21 children under the age of 5 due to malnutrition this year so far. According to the World Food Programme, 'nearly one person in three is not eating for days' in Gaza. Aid groups demand access to Gaza More than 100 aid and human rights organisations issued a joint appeal on Wednesday calling for access to starving people in the Gaza Strip. 'Just outside Gaza, in warehouses — and even within Gaza itself — tonnes of food, clean water, medical supplies, shelter items and fuel sit untouched with humanitarian organisations blocked from accessing or delivering them,' the 109 groups, which include Doctors Without Borders, Amnesty International and Save the Children, write. 'The Government of Israel's restrictions, delays, and fragmentation under its total siege have created chaos, starvation, and death,' they say. 'The starvation of civilians as a method of warfare is a war crime,' they warn. Israel has so far not commented on the appeal. Israel rejects accusations of famine The Times of Israel recently quoted a senior Israeli security official as saying that the military was not aware of 'famine' in Gaza. However, he conceded that measures were needed to stabilize the humanitarian situation in the sealed-off coastal enclave. An Israeli government spokesman admitted on Wednesday that there is indeed hunger in the Gaza Strip, but stressed that this was not Israel's fault. He accused the UN of failing to pick up up aid lorries that are already inside the Gaza Strip and taking them to the people. The UN has rejected such claims, noting that its aid organizations rarely receive permission for aid lorries to enter the strip. More than 1,600 lorries carrying UN aid were authorized to enter Gaza between mid-May to mid-July, which amounts to less than 30 lorries per day. Meanwhile, more than 600 to 650 trucks per day are needed to meet the civilian population's most basic needs, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). According to an Israeli government spokesman, more than 4,400 lorries carrying aid entered the Gaza Strip between July 19 and 22. Ten people died of hunger in the past 24 hours, according to the local health authority in Gaza, with a total of 111 Palestinians having died due to the lack of food so far. The United Nations has fixed guidelines to identify famine, which is only declared when at least 2% per 10,000 people 'die daily of starvation, disease and malnutrition;' when at least 20% of households 'face extreme food shortages'; and when at least 30% of children 'suffer from acute malnutrition.' The UN has cautioned that it is difficult to assess these criteria in the Gaza Strip in view of ongoing Israeli attacks and the displacement of the population.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store