GAZA STRIP (Palestinian Territories): Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry said on Friday that Israeli fire killed 20 people and wounded 155 waiting to receive desperately needed aid in the besieged territory, but Israel said the reports were “erroneous”.
With the United Nations warning of a looming famine in Gaza, besieged by Israel after the October 7 attack by Hamas militants, a Spanish aid ship sailed closer to the Gaza coast opening a maritime corridor from Cyprus.
Efforts to get food and other aid into Gaza have grown, including by air and sea, but fighting rages on after mediators failed to reach a truce for the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
The health ministry in Gaza accused Israeli troops of opening fire from “tanks and helicopters” as Palestinians gathered at a roundabout in Gaza City in the north, revising upward an initial toll of 11 killed and 100 wounded.
Mohammed Ghurab, director of emergency services at a hospital in northern Gaza, told AFP there were “direct shots by the occupation forces” on people waiting for a food truck.
An AFP journalist on the scene saw several bodies and people who had been shot.
The Israeli military denied it had opened fire on the crowd.
“Press reports that Israeli forces attacked dozens of Gazans at an aid distribution point are erroneous,” it said in a brief statement, adding that it was “analysing the incident seriously”.
The humanitarian emergency has forced some countries to use airdrops and sea routes for aid supplies because of limited land access to Gaza via Jordan, Israel and Egypt.
The Spanish aid vessel Open Arms, towing about 200 tonnes of food supplied by the US NGO World Central Kitchen (WCK), was about 30 kilometres off Gaza, the MarineTraffic website showed, after it left Cyprus three days earlier.
A WCK team in Gaza has built a floating jetty onto which cargo destined for people in northern Gaza can be unloaded. The group’s president Erin Gore said they hoped to unload about 300,000 meals as soon as possible.
Cyprus has said a second, bigger vessel was being readied for the maritime aid corridor, which will be complemented by a temporary pier to be built off Gaza by US troops. – AFP
