Aid-seeking Gazans killed, hurt in strike
R AFAH, Gaza Strip: An apparent Israeli strike on a crowd of Palestinians waiting for humanitarian aid in Gaza City has killed AND WOUNDED DOZENS, LOCAL HOSPITAL OFfiCIALS SAID on Thursday.
The city and the rest of the northern Gaza Strip were the first targets of Israel’s air, sea and ground offensive launched in response to Hamas’ October 7 attacks on the country’s south. The area has suffered widespread devastation and has been largely isolated from the rest of the territory for months, with little aid entering.
Aid groups say it has become nearly impossible to deliver humanitarian assistance in most of Gaza, in part because of the crowds of desperate people who overwhelm aid convoys. The United Nations says a quarter of Gaza’s 2.3 million Palestinians face starvation.
Dr. Jadallah Shafai, the head of the nursing department at Shifa Hospital, told the Al Jazeera network that about 50 people were killed and 250 wounded. Al Jazeera ran footage showing several bodies and injured people arriving at Shifa.
Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya, director of the Kamal Adwan Hospital, said it had received at least 10 bodies and 160 wounded people.
Fares Afana, head of Kamal Adwan’s ambulance service, said medics arriving at the scene found “dozens or hundreds” lying on the ground.
He added that there were not enough ambulances to collect all the dead and wounded, and that some were being brought to hospitals on donkey carts.
Dr. Mohammad Salha, acting director of the Al-Awda Hospital, said it received 90 wounded and three dead, who were later transferred to Kamal Adwan.
“We expect [an increase] in the number killed,” he said. “There are many wounded still at the reception and the emergency room.”
He also said Al-Awda was largely out of commission, with no electricity and the operating room running on battery power with only hours left. Gaza’s health sector is under severe strain nearly five months into the Israel-Hamas war.
The Israeli military said it was looking into the reports.
Gaza’s Hamas-run Health Ministry did not immediately provide an official toll from the strike.
Over 30,000 Palestinians have been killed since the start of the war, two-thirds of them women and children, the ministry said on Thursday. Its count does not differentiate between civilians and combatants.
Hamas’ attacks on southern Israel killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and the militants seized about 250 hostages. The militant group is still holding about 130 hostages, a quarter of whom are believed to be dead, after releasing most of the others during a weeklong ceasefire in November.