Hungry Gazans killed while waiting for food as NGOs warn US-Israel aid group of war crime complicity

Hundreds have died since May near Gaza Humanitarian Foundation feeding sites

Palestinians injured by Israeli fire at a food aid distribution point are treated at Al Awda Hospital in Gaza's Nuseirat refugee camp. AFP

Thirty-two people were killed in Gaza on Tuesday morning while waiting for aid, Palestinian media reported, the latest in a series of deaths in recent weeks among homeless and hungry Gazans.

Official news agency Wafa said Israeli forces launched a wave of air attacks across the Gaza city area and on aid distribution points south of Wadi Gaza in the centre of the territory.

North of Rafah, three people were shot dead and others were injured when Israeli troops shot at groups queuing for supplies, Wafa said, citing medical sources.

Across Gaza on Tuesday at least 51 Palestinians were killed, it added, as Israel continues its offensive in the enclave.

Ten people were killed in Israeli shelling on a home in the Al Sabra neighbourhood south of Gaza city, Wafa quoted sources at Al Ahli Arab Hospital as saying.

Israeli drones also opened fire to the north-east of Al Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza, Wafa said.

More than 500 Palestinians have been killed at aid distribution points by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation since its inception on May 27, including 93 who were killed by Israeli gunfire as they approached UN aid trucks, spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Thameen Al Kheetan said in a statement on Tuesday.

He said only a few UN aid trucks have been allowed into Gaza since March 2, 2025.

"Israel’s militarised humanitarian assistance mechanism is in contradiction with international standards on aid distribution. It endangers civilians, and contributes to the catastrophic humanitarian situation in Gaza," he said.

Mr Al Kheetan called preventing people's access to necessary services a "war crime". The foundation was set up after Israel eased a blockade on relief supplies to the territory that lasted more than two months.

Medical agency Doctors Without Borders has sounded the alarm over patterns of what it called "ethnic cleansing" in Gaza.

Doctors Without Borders head sounds alarm over pattern of 'genocide and ethnic cleansing' in Gaza

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UN agencies and major aid groups have refused to co-operate with the GHF, suspicious that it has been created to advance Israeli military objectives and throw Gazans off their land.

Israeli troops have been accused of opening fire on Palestinians near the foundation's sites. It has denied responsibility for deaths near its distribution points, making statements at odds with witnesses and the Gaza authorities have said.

On Monday, 15 legal and human rights organisations issued an open letter calling on the GHF to end its work, warning those involved with its operations that they risk charges of complicity in war crimes as it was not in line with humanitarian principles and international law.

Signatories to the letter included the International Federation for Human Rights, the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights, the American Centre for Constitutional Rights and the International Commission of Jurists.

"Individuals and corporate entities involved in the planning, financing, or execution of the GHF scheme may incur criminal liability – including under universal jurisdiction statutes – for aiding and abetting war crimes such as the forcible displacement of civilians, starvation as a method of warfare and denial of humanitarian access," the letter said.

The 15 said the GHF's work was "dehumanising, repeatedly deadly and contributes to the forced displacement of the very population it purports to help".

They said GHF operations lack transparency and accountability, and that its work forces Palestinians to walk long distances through militarised zones to obtain food, creating a risk of forced displacement.

"This new model of privatised, militarised aid distribution constitutes a radical and dangerous shift away from established international humanitarian relief operations," they said.

The groups urged the GHF and all who have been supporting its work "to cease their operations".

"Failure to do so may expose these organisations ... to further risk of criminal and civil liability for aiding and abetting or otherwise being complicit in crimes under international law, including war crimes, crimes against humanity, or genocide in violation of international law," the letter said.

Gaza’s health ministry said on Tuesday that hospitals had received 79 bodies and 289 injured over the past 24 hours, including 49 people killed and 197 injured while collecting aid.

The overall Palestinian toll from the war rose to 56,077 dead and 131,848 wounded, it said, including 516 deaths and 3,799 injuries related to aid distribution.

The war began on October 7, 2023 when Hamas and other militant groups from Gaza killed about 1,200 people and took about 250 hostage in raids on southern Israel.