Palestinians are delivered to Nasser hospital in Khan Younis after being wounded or killed by Israeli forces whereas they tried to get meals on Tuesday.
Moaz Abu Taha/APAimages through Reuters
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Moaz Abu Taha/APAimages through Reuters
GAZA CITY and DUBAI — Israel’s main focus is now its conflict with Iran, however Israeli troops are nonetheless holding territory deep inside Gaza, and Tuesday marked the deadliest day in current weeks for Palestinians there attempting to achieve meals distribution websites and vans.
Well being officers in Gaza say not less than 59 individuals had been killed by Israeli navy drones and artillery fireplace Tuesday, and greater than 200 wounded, attempting to get meals. A lot of the deaths, not less than 45, occurred at an intersection in southern Gaza’s metropolis of Khan Younis, the place a big crowd of individuals had amassed ready for vans to enter carrying flour.
It was the deadliest single incident of individuals desperately attempting to put their palms on meals since late March, when Israel started permitting a trickle of help into Gaza following almost three months of complete blockade.
Israeli assaults on Palestinians attempting to achieve meals help since March 27 have killed not less than 400 individuals and wounded greater than 3,000, in keeping with Gaza’s Well being Ministry, which releases day by day loss of life counts. These killed whereas in search of help are among the many ministry’s total loss of life toll of almost 55,500 individuals killed within the conflict.
Israel says its restrictions on meals and its continued blockade of different help is to maintain the gadgets from benefiting Hamas. The group holds an estimated 20 hostages nonetheless alive and the our bodies of 33 deceased hostages, taken within the lethal Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, assault on Israel.
The help restrictions have plunged households in Gaza into excessive starvation. Half 1,000,000 individuals in Gaza at the moment are ravenous and your complete territory is liable to famine, in keeping with a report final month by dozens of impartial specialists on starvation.
Palestinians carry the our bodies of kinfolk killed in an Israeli strike, at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis on Tuesday.
Mariam Dagga/AP/AP
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Mariam Dagga/AP/AP
“I noticed so many useless individuals”
Individuals started amassing late Monday afternoon in an space of Khan Younis on phrase that help vans had been going to enter from Israel, mentioned Salim Saigaly.
The 32-year-old instructor walked from his tent encampment close to the coast for a number of hours within the hopes of getting a sack of flour to feed his 4 youngsters.
“More often than not I attempt to distract my youngsters after they discuss of starvation, till they fall asleep,” he mentioned, including that usually does not work. “So, I made a decision to go and take the chance and get some flour.”
He and others slept on the street in a single day, ready for the vans. He mentioned he was planning to seize a sack of flour off the vans, however was additionally carrying the equal of $170 to purchase one from others there in case he could not get it on his personal.
Palestinian survivors and docs say simply earlier than 9 a.m., the gang swelled and moved nearer to the principle roundabout, which is in an space Israel has ordered evacuated. They are saying that is when Israeli drones fired onto the gang. Artillery shells had been additionally fired.
Israel’s navy advised NPR the incident is beneath assessment and occurred close to an space the place troops are.
“Fortunately for me, shrapnel didn’t hit me, however what truly fell over me had been items of human flesh and bones,” Saigaly mentioned. “I noticed so many useless individuals.”
He returned to his household empty-handed, having barely escaped along with his life, Saigaly mentioned.
Movies from the scene present swimming pools of blood and our bodies on the bottom, some nonetheless carrying empty guide luggage they’d hoped to fill with flour.
Palestinians injured in Israeli fireplace as they gathered close to a meals help heart obtain care at Khan Younis’ Nasser hospital within the southern Gaza Strip on Tuesday.
AFP/through Getty Photographs
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AFP/through Getty Photographs
Gaza’s essential hospital struggles to manage
The useless and wounded had been delivered to the close by Nasser Hospital, the final functioning hospital within the space and at the moment Gaza’s largest. Movies taken by hospital workers and shared on-line confirmed our bodies piled excessive on donkey-drawn carts exterior its emergency room.
Nasser Hospital, which has been bombed and raided by the Israeli navy all through the conflict, has simply six working rooms. The hospital was already previous capability, with lots of of sufferers being handled inside and round 50 individuals, together with youngsters, in its intensive care unit from different incidents of troops firing onto crowds of individuals attempting to achieve meals help in current days and weeks. The hospital sits in an space Israel’s navy has ordered evacuated.
Docs With out Borders, which has workers on the hospital, mentioned its medical crew needed to evacuate the maternity ward to make room for the wounded from Israel’s assault in Khan Younis on Tuesday. The group says most of the injured required amputations.
“The hospital has exceeded its capability and is working with restricted provides. It might collapse at any second,” the group’s emergency coordinator Aitor Zabalgogeazkoa mentioned.
Every day killings of individuals attempting to get help
The U.N. says a lot of the help it has been in a position to deliver into Gaza has been taken by hungry crowds off its vans earlier than they will attain warehouses.
A household mourns a younger man killed by Israeli forces whereas attempting to get a sack of flour off U.N. help vans coming into northern Gaza on Saturday, June, 14, 2025.
Anas Baba/NPR
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Anas Baba/NPR
Over the weekend, greater than 20 individuals in northern Gaza had been killed by Israeli fireplace whereas ready for U.N. help vans to enter by means of a northern border crossing, additionally in a crimson evacuation zone. Israel’s navy didn’t reply to a request for touch upon that incident.
A lot of the deaths over the previous three weeks, although, have been close to new meals distribution websites constructed by Israel’s navy and run by U.S. contractors and an organization referred to as the Gaza Humanitarian Basis or GHF. Israel says its forces have fired warning photographs at crowds in these areas, with out elaborating.
The Crimson Cross Subject Hospital in southern Gaza mentioned on Sunday it acquired greater than 170 individuals, a lot of whom had been wounded by gunshots, as they tried to entry certainly one of GHF’s websites in southern Gaza. And on Monday, the sector hospital mentioned one other 200 circumstances arrived on the hospital beneath related circumstances.
There have been further casualties close to GHF’s websites on Tuesday, as effectively, Gaza’s well being ministry says.
The U.S. and Israel say the brand new mechanism run by GHF is geared toward maintaining help from enriching Hamas.
The meals is being distributed at 4 fenced-off websites beneath erratic working occasions. The websites are all situated in navy crimson zones of Gaza. This has drawn hundreds of Palestinians virtually day by day to areas designated as off-limits to them, and the place Israeli troops are positioned.
In an announcement Tuesday, GHF mentioned, “Individuals are ravenous in Gaza and their desperation can create hazardous situations.” The group mentioned that till there’s sufficient meals in Gaza, it won’t all the time full orderly deliveries however is doing all the things it may to offer meals rapidly.
Farhan Haq, a U.N. spokesperson, mentioned the brand new system “must be stopped” earlier than extra persons are killed.
“We’ve got made clear, since this explicit scheme for help distribution was developed, that we didn’t assume it will work,” he mentioned. “And now I believe the entire world can see that that was the case.”
NPR’s Aya Batrawy reported from Dubai, Anas Baba reported from Gaza Metropolis, and Abu Bakr Bashir reported from London.
