54 Palestinians including 22 aid seekers killed in fresh Israeli air strikes
UN urges ‘unimpeded humanitarian access’ in Gaza
Monitoring Desk
GAZA: At least 54 Palestinians, including 22 aid seekers, have been killed and 831 injured in Israeli attacks across Gaza in 24 hours, according to the enclave’s Health Ministry.
Four bodies were also recovered from the rubble of previous Israeli attacks, the ministry said on Telegram.
In a latest update, a source at al-Ahli Arab Hospital told Al Jazeera that Israeli military fighter jets have bombed a home in the Zeitoun neighbourhood of Gaza City, killing at least eight people, quoting Gaza’s Health Ministry.
The ministry has also recorded four more hunger-related deaths over the past 24 hours, bringing the total count of hunger-related deaths to 239, including 106 children. The total number of aid seekers killed since May 27, when Israel introduced a new aid distribution mechanism through the US-based Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), has reached 1,881, with more than 13,863 injured, the statement said.
Natasha Davies, a nursing activity manager with Doctors Without Borders (MSF), told Al Jazeera there is aid sitting all around the boundary between Israel and Gaza that is not being allowed in.
“We’ve had a couple of trucks in [to Gaza], but really, it’s just a drop in the ocean … We run primarily a trauma surgical hospital, so every single patient has a wound of some sort that needs fixing with supplies that we are intermittently receiving,” Davies said by videolink from Gaza’s southern city of Khan Younis.
“It’s just a humanitarian catastrophe. There are these GHF sites, which are slaughter masquerading as aid, which create mass casualty incidents, which create more injuries for us to treat with limited resources,” she said.
“The aid drops, which are not only ineffective but dangerous, just create chaos. They … cause more injuries. It’s just a never-ending cycle of trauma and injuries for the Palestinian people, which could easily be changed if Israel would facilitate the movement of our trucks inside. We have roads. We have trucks. Everything is ready,” she said.
The aid blockade has led to a devastating reality; in the past few weeks, people literally started to faint in the streets, medical staff collapsed while operating on patients, and blood donors were deemed unfit to donate blood due to malnutrition.
The claim by Israel and the Israeli military that there is no limit to humanitarian aid is absolutely baseless and largely contradicted on the ground. For five months, the delivery of life-saving supplies has been deliberately strangled by the Israeli military.
The result has left warehouses empty, hospitals without medicine, and families without any food.
The UN agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) has said that temperatures reached above 40°C in Gaza, “making an already desperate situation far worse.”
In a post on X, UNRWA said: “Bombardments and forced displacement continue. With limited electricity and fuel, there is no relief from the extreme heat.”
Meanwhile, the United Nations has urged “unimpeded humanitarian access” across Gaza amid Israel’s blockade of aid in the famine-stricken territory.
In a post on X, it said: “Palestinians are enduring a humanitarian catastrophe of horrific proportions. Children in Gaza are dying from starvation and bombardments.”
