GAZA CITY — A new Guardian investigation covering roughly 50 days of food distribution in Gaza has revealed a sustained pattern of Israeli forces firing on starving Palestinian aid seekers near aid sites run by the controversial US and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).
The probe analysed visual evidence, bullets, medical data and patterns of injuries from two hospitals, as well as interviews with medical organisations and surgeons, across approximately 50 days of food distribution.
The Guardian studied more than 30 videos of gunfire near GHF food distribution sites. More than 2,000 Palestinians were injured during the 48 days investigated, mostly by gunshots.
In the footage, machine-gun fire can be heard on at least 11 days near the food distribution sites. Bullet casings recovered from patients, and patterns of fire analysed by weapons experts, suggest they were Israeli munitions.
According to the probe, Palestinians who travel to GHF sites have come under systematic and indiscriminate Israeli gunfire.
Doctors at Nasser hospital in Khan Younis and the Red Cross field hospital in Rafah described treating an unprecedented number of gunshot wounds. Almost all responsive patients arriving at the field hospital say they were shot by the Israeli military while trying to reach a food distribution site.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said the casualty numbers were higher than the combined number of patients they had treated during mass-casualty incidents over the entire previous year. In data seen by the Guardian, more than 100 of these patients were declared dead on arrival.
According to the UN, at least 1,373 Palestinians have been killed since 27 May while seeking food, with 859 killed in the vicinity of GHF sites and 514 along the routes of food convoys.
According to the investigation, a long road runs near the GHF food site in northern Rafah, where crowds gather that are so large they can be seen from space. It is here that Palestinians trying to get food have come under intense fire.
“The gunfire at us was random,” said Mohammed Sleiman Abu Lebda, 20, covered in bandages and watching the video on his phone from a hospital bed. He said he had been waiting for two hours at the distribution site when the Israeli military opened fire on the crowd in July.
The Israeli military acknowledged opening fire on “suspects” or firing “warning shots” on eight occasions, but repeatedly denied targeting civilians. In some of these cases, it said it was aware of reports of injuries, and seven cases were “under review”. In several cases, the GHF denied there had been “an incident” in the immediate vicinity of its sites.
The British weapons expert Chris Cobb-Smith, commenting on the footage in which gunshots pepper the sand, said the action was “reckless and irresponsible”, adding: “There is no tactical reason to employ small-arms fire to that degree near crowds of non-combatants. It is utterly outrageous.”
Trevor Ball, an American weapons expert, said: “If this is intended as warning shots, it is an unsafe practice. Aiming that close to people creates a significant risk of harm or death. Bullets can ricochet, as well as have their trajectory affected by the wind and other non-human, as well as human, factors. These risks increase with distance.”
A surgeon at Nasser, Goher Rahbour, described treating an unusually high number of mass-casualty incidents, mostly young boys returning from GHF sites: “100% of the time, [they said] it’s from the Israeli forces.”
In Rafah, the 60-bed Red Cross field hospital received more than 2,200 patients from more than 21 separate mass-casualty incidents – those with more than 30 injured people at once – between 27 May, when the GHF sites opened, and 26 June, according to hospital admission records seen by the Guardian.
Reviewing the Guardian’s findings, Adil Haque, a professor of law at Rutgers University, New Jersey, said: “These are grave breaches of the fourth Geneva convention as well as war crimes under customary international law and the ICC [international criminal court] statute. A soldier may argue that they acted reasonably to defend themselves or others. However, it is neither reasonable nor proportionate to fire on unarmed civilians at a distance.”
Several recent reports confirmed that members of the Israeli military had been ordered to open fire on civilians collecting food, while US contractors said their colleagues had fired live ammunition at Palestinians collecting food in Gaza.
A GHF spokesperson accused the Guardian of aiding a “terrorist organisation” and said: “The false and exaggerated statistics used in these reports seem to directly align with the Hamas-controlled Gaza health ministry..”
C. QNN
