At least 16 Palestinians waiting for food aid were killed by Israeli troops near the Netzarim Corridor in northern Gaza.
At least 81 people have been killed in Israeli attacks across the Gaza Strip as desperate Palestinians continue to seek food amid an ongoing hunger crisis.
Among those killed since dawn on Thursday, 59 were in Gaza City and the north and 16 others were waiting for aid assistance near the Netzarim Corridor, which splits north and south Gaza.
Starving Palestinians have gathered in the area daily to receive packages from the United States- and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which the United Nations has condemned for its “weaponisation” of aid.
Bassam Abu Shaar, who witnessed the Israeli attack at the aid site, told the AFP news agency that people had gathered overnight in the hope of receiving food.
“Around 1am [22:00 GMT Wednesday], they started shooting at us. The gunfire intensified from tanks, aircraft and quadcopter bombs,” he told AFP by phone.
“We couldn’t help them or even escape ourselves,” he said, adding that the size of the crowd had made it impossible for people to flee Israeli fire near the Shuhada Junction.
In recent weeks, Israeli attacks on Palestinians attempting to receive food aid have increased, killing dozens of people.
Deadly ‘daily routine’
Reporting from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, Al Jazeera’s Tareq Abu Azzoum said the attacks on people at aid sites are becoming a “daily routine”.
“More than three months of full [Israeli] blockade on border crossings has turned Gaza into a hunger point where people have run out of all kinds of humanitarian supplies and now found themselves to be forced to move to these designated centres to get bags of flour, bottles of water and alongside food boxes that, according to nutritional experts, contain low nutritional value,” Azzoum explained.
“These attacks are still unfolding, turning all humanitarian corridors into killing grounds,” he said.
According to the Reuters news agency, the Israeli military claimed, without providing evidence, that there were attempts by “suspects” to approach forces in the area of Netzarim in a way that had endangered them.
The army added that forces fired warning shots to prevent suspects from approaching them, and it was currently unaware of injuries in the incident.
Separately, an Israeli drone attack on a charging point in Shati Refugee Camp killed 19 people. At the same time, an Israeli aircraft launched intensive air strikes and bombarded several homes in Jabalia, northern Gaza.
Over the past 24 hours, 69 bodies, including two that were recovered after an attack, and 221 wounded people were admitted to hospitals in the besieged enclave, medical sources said.
Since the war began in October 2023, at least 55,706 people have been killed and 130,101 wounded, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
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