GAZA CITY: Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli fire killed 22 people across the Palestinian territory on Thursday, including 16 who were waiting to collect aid.

The distribution of food and basic supplies in the war-ravaged Gaza Strip has become increasingly fraught and perilous, exacerbating the territory’s deep hunger crisis.

Civil defence official Mohammed al-Mughayyir told AFP that the Al-Awda Hospital received 10 dead and around 200 wounded, including women and children, “after Israeli drones dropped multiple bombs on gatherings of civilians near an aid distribution point around the Netzarim checkpoint in central Gaza”.

He said that Gaza City’s Al-Shifa Hospital received six dead following Israeli attacks on aid queues near Netzarim and in the Al-Sudaniya area in northwestern Gaza.

GHF accuses Hamas of attacking aid workers; Palestinian group calls the foundation a ‘filthy tool’ of Israeli forces

The Israeli army said it was looking into the reports when asked for comment by AFP. Restrictions imposed on media in the Gaza Strip and the difficulties of access on the ground mean AFP is not able to independently verify the death tolls.

Mughayyir said another six people were killed in Israeli attacks across Gaza.

Aid workers

The US- and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) on Thursday accused Palestinian group Hamas of attacking aid workers en route to distribution centres, saying that at least eight people had been killed.

GHF had earlier given a toll of at least five killed in the attack, which took place late Wednesday in the southern Gaza Strip.

“We are still collecting more information on the deadly and unprovoked attack on our dedicated local team members and volunteers,” GHF interim executive director John Acree said in a statement.

“As of now, we can confirm at least eight fatalities, multiple injuries, and we fear that some of our team members have been taken hostage,” he added.

In an earlier statement, GHF said a bus carrying more than two dozen members of it team, “local Palestinians working side by side with the US GHF team to deliver critical aid, were brutally attacked by Hamas”.

It said the team was en route to one of the foundation’s distribution centres west of Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip.

“We carefully considered closing our sites today given the heightened security risks and safety concerns, but we decided that the best response to … murderers was to keep delivering food for the people of Gaza who are counting on us,” Acree said in the group’s update.

“We will not be deterred from our mission towards providing food security for the Palestinian people in Gaza.”

An officially private effort with opaque funding and backed by Israel, GHF began operations on May 26 after Israel completely cut off supplies into Gaza for more than two months, sparking warnings of mass famine.

The United Nations and major aid groups have refused to cooperate with the foundation over concerns it was designed to cater to Israeli military objectives. GHF claimed it had distributed nearly 2.6 million meals today and more than 18.6 million to date.

Hamas accused GHF of becoming a “filthy tool” of Israeli forces. “The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation has become a filthy tool in the hands of the occupying army, used to lure civilians into deadly traps,” the Hamas government media office in Gaza told AFP on Thursday.

Published in Dawn, June 13th, 2025