Gaza: 875 Killed Seeking Food Amid Blockade, Says UN

An UNRWA worker in Gaza checks a child for signs of malnutrition.

Nearly 900 people have been killed in Gaza in recent weeks while trying to fetch food, with most deaths linked to private aid hubs run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), the UN human rights office (OHCHR) said on Tuesday.

“As of 13 July, we have recorded 875 people killed in Gaza while trying to get food; 674 of them were killed in the vicinity of GHF sites,” said Thameen Al-Kheetan, OHCHR spokesperson.

The remaining 201 victims were killed while seeking food “on the routes of aid convoys or near aid convoys” run by the UN or UN partners still operating in the war-shattered enclave, Mr Al-Kheetan told journalists in Geneva.

Killings linked to the controversial US- and Israeli-backed aid hubs began shortly after they started operating in southern Gaza on 27 May, bypassing the UN and other established NGOs.

The latest deadly incident occurred at around 9am on Monday 14 July, when reports indicated that the Israeli military shelled and fired at Palestinians seeking food at the GHF site in the As Shakoush area, northwestern Rafah.

According to OHCHR, two Palestinians were killed and at least nine others were injured. Some of the casualties were transported to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) hospital in Rafah. On Saturday, medics there received more than 130 patients, the “overwhelming majority” suffering from gunshot wounds, and “all responsive individuals” reported they were attempting to access food distribution sites.

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) expressed deep concerns about the continued killing of civilians trying to access food, while deadly malnutrition spreads among children.

“Our teams on the ground — UNRWA teams and other United Nations teams — have spoken to survivors of these killings, including starving children, who were shot at while on their way to collect very little food,” said Juliette Touma, UNRWA Director of Communications.

Speaking via video from Amman, Ms Touma insisted that the near-total Israeli blockade of Gaza has led to babies dying from the effects of severe acute malnutrition.

“We've been banned from bringing in any humanitarian assistance into Gaza for more than four months now,” she said, before pointing to a “significant increase” in child malnutrition since the Israeli blockade began on 2 March.

Ms Touma added: “We have 6,000 trucks waiting in places like Egypt and Jordan; from Jordan to the Gaza Strip it's a three-hour drive, right?”

In addition to food supplies, these UN trucks contain other vital yet basic supplies, including bars of soap. “Medicine and food are going to soon expire if we're not able to get those supplies to people in Gaza who need it most — among them one million children who are half of the population of the Gaza Strip,” Ms Touma continued.

Meanwhile, in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, Palestinians continue to be killed in violence allegedly linked to Israeli settlers and security forces, UN agencies said.

According to OHCHR, two-year-old Laila Khatib was shot in the head by Israeli security forces on 25 January while she was inside her house in Ash-Shuhada village in Jenin.

On 3 July, 61-year-old Walid Badir was shot and killed by Israeli security forces, reportedly while he was cycling home from prayers, passing through the outskirts of the Nur Shams camp, the UN rights office continued, pointing to intensifying “killings, attacks and harassment of Palestinians in recent weeks.”

“This includes the demolition of hundreds of homes and forced mass displacement of Palestinians,” OHCHR’s Mr Al-Kheetan noted, with some 30,000 Palestinians forcibly displaced since the launch of Israel’s operation “Iron Wall” in the north of the occupied West Bank earlier this year.

“We should recall that international law is very clear about this in terms of the obligations of the occupying power,” he said. “Bringing about a permanent demographic change inside the occupied territory may amount to a war crime and is tantamount to ethnic cleansing.”

“We continue to have a silent war that is surging, where heavy restrictions on movement continue, where poverty is increasing as people are cut off from their livelihoods and unemployment soars,” said UNRWA’s Ms Touma.

With its current focus on the northern occupied West Bank, the Israeli military operation has impacted the refugee camps of Jenin, Tulkarem, and Nur Shams.

“It is causing the largest population displacement of Palestinians in the West Bank since 1967,” Ms Touma concluded.