US food aid group: Workers killed in air strike in Gaza

Seven aid workers from World Central Kitchen were killed in an air strike by the Israeli military in Gaza, the disaster relief group founded by celebrity chef José Andrés said in a post on X.

The U.s.-based group has helped oversee the construction of a pier and the delivery of aid through it to the northern Gaza Strip, where humanitarian agencies say hundreds of thousands of Palestinians are living in dire conditions, including malnutrition and hunger.

“This is not only an attack against WCK, this is an attack on humanitarian organizations showing up in the most dire of situations where food is being used as a weapon of war. This is unforgivable,” said World Central Kitchen CEO Erin Gore, adding that the organization was pausing operations in the region.

The seven killed are from “Australia, Poland, United Kingdom, a dual citizen of the U.S. and Canada, and Palestine,” the group said in a statement.

“Unfortunately, in the past day there was a tragic case of our forces unintentionally hitting innocent people in the Gaza Strip,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, without specifying further. He added that Israel “will do everything so that this does not happen again.”

The war in Gaza started shortly after the militant group Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, killing about 1,200 people and abducting some 250 others. Israel started a military campaign against the group, which is designated a terrorist group by the U.S. and E.U., in a conflict that has killed more than 32,000 Palestinians, according to authorities in the Hamasrun enclave.