The UN High Commissioner of Human Rights, Volker Türk, described on Tuesday, June 3 as “war crimes” attacks against civilians near the aid centers in the Gaza Strip.
“Mortal attacks against desperate civilians trying to access the amounts of food aid in Gaza are inadmissible. For the third consecutive day, people were killed around a distribution of aid administered by the Humanitarian Foundation of Gaza,” Volker Türk said in a statement.
Gaza’s civil defense said that 27 people had been killed by the Israeli army fire near a humanitarian aid distribution center in Rafah, in the south of the Palestinian territory.
“Twenty-seven people were killed and more than 90 wounds in the massacre of civilians waiting for US help in the Al-Alam area in Rafah,” said Civil Defense spokesman Mahmoud Bassal, which he had previously indicated that the victims had succumbed “to the Israeli forces of the fire.”
The Israeli army says that it has faced “suspects”
This new drama is similar to the one that occurred on Sunday in the same place, during which 31 people were killed and 176 wounds for Israeli shots according to help, when they were on their way to seek help, according to testimonies.
The roundabout is located approximately one kilometer from a help center managed by the Humanitarian Foundation Gaza (GHF), an organization with opaque funds backed by the United States and Israel, which began its operations just over a week ago and with which the UN refuses to work due to concerns about its processes and neutrality.
The Israeli army said he faced “suspects” during a multitude movement along the roads that lead to the help distribution site.
Approximately half a kilometer from there, “the soldiers made warning shots and, while the suspects did not retire, again they shot in the direction of some suspects who approached them,” he added in a statement.
“They threw directly on people”
Rania Al-Atal, a 30-year-old movement, told AFP that she left with her husband to try to recover food at the GHF center, leaving her children with her mother in her store.
“The shots began intermittently around 5 in the morning. Every time people approached Al-Alam’s roundabout, they were the target of fire,” he said.
“But people were not careful and hurried at the same time. That’s when the army began to shoot a lot.”
Mohammed Al-Chaer, 44, also present at the scene, said the crowd had just gone to the help center when “suddenly, the Israeli army shot in the air, then began to shoot directly on people.”
“A helicopter and drones began to shoot the crowd to prevent the tanks from approaching. There were injuries and dead,” he told AFP.
“I did not arrive at the center and we did not receive food.”
Almost 55,000 Palestinians killed since October 2023
In his press release, the Army said “that it did not prevent the arrival of Gazaouis civilians in humanitarian aid distribution sites.” The GHF Foundation said in a press release that the operations in place had taken place safely on Tuesday.
The UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, requested an independent investigation on Sunday near the same roundabout of Al-Alam on Monday, not far from a humanitarian aid center administered by GHF.
The army denied having, that day, “got on civilians while they were close or inside” of the Center of GHF. But an Israeli military source recognized “citation (…) in the direction of several suspects.”
In the war for almost 20 months in the Gaza Strip against Hamas after the attack on the Palestinian Islamist movement on October 7, 2023 in its soil, Israel faces a growing international pressure to end the conflict.
The humanitarian situation is disastrous in the Palestinian territory, where Israel imposed a complete blockade for more than two months, partially relaxed at the end of May. More than 54,470 Palestinians, mainly civilians, were killed in Israeli military retaliations, according to data from the Ministry of Hamas, considered reliable by the UN.
Source: BFM TV
