CAIRO/JERUSALEM: At least 20 Palestinians were killed on Wednesday at an aid distribution site run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in what the US-backed group said was a crowd surge instigated by armed agitators.
The GHF, which is supported by Israel, said 19 people were trampled and one fatally stabbed during the crush at one of its centres in Khan Younis in southern Gaza.
“We have credible reason to believe that elements within the crowd – armed and affiliated with Hamas – deliberately fomented the unrest,” GHF said in a statement.
Hamas rejected the GHF allegation as “false and misleading”, saying GHF guards and Israeli soldiers sprayed people with pepper gas and opened fire.
GHF said Hamas’ account was “blatantly false”.
“At no point was tear gas deployed, nor were shots fired into the crowd. Limited use of pepper spray was deployed, only to safeguard additional loss of life,” GHF said in a written response to Reuters via e-mail.
“Today’s incident is part of a larger pattern of Hamas trying to undermine and ultimately end GHF. It is no coincidence that this incident occurred during ceasefire negotiations, where Hamas continues to demand that GHF cease operations.”
Witnesses told Reuters that guards at the site sprayed pepper gas at them after they had locked the gates to the centre, trapping them between the gates and the outer wire-fence.
“People kept gathering and pressuring each other; when people pushed each other...those who couldn’t stand fell under the people and were crushed,” said eyewitness Mahmoud Fojo, 21, who was hurt in the stampede.
“Some people started jumping over the netted fence and got wounded. We were injured, and God saved us. We were under the people and we said the Shahada (death prayers). We thought we were dying, finished,” he added.
There was no immediate comment from the Israeli army on Hamas and eyewitness accounts.
Palestinian health officials told Reuters that 21 people had died of suffocation at the site. One medic said lots of people had been crammed into a small space and had been crushed. On Tuesday, the UN rights office in Geneva said it had recorded at least 875 killings within the past six weeks in the vicinity of aid sites and food convoys in Gaza - the majority of them close to GHF distribution points.
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