The United Nations (UN) has released a video depicting bullets striking just inches away from Palestinians who are waiting for food supplies in the Gaza Strip.
In recent months, numerous Palestinians have lost their lives in Gaza at food distribution locations. While Palestinians attribute these fatalities to Israeli gunfire and airstrikes, Israel contends that Hamas is responsible for these deaths.
A video shared by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) on Thursday via X captures the sound of gunfire, with bullets impacting just inches away from hundreds of Palestinians who are seated quietly as a UN convoy delivering food supplies approaches.
In the video, the OCHA stated, “Israeli forces were firing warning shots just inches from a crowd waiting for a UN convoy with food supplies.”
The OCHA also reported that at least one Palestinian at the scene sustained injuries and received treatment from UN personnel.
The footage of Israeli soldiers firing at Palestinians has surfaced amid escalating outrage regarding the Israeli military actions in Gaza, particularly concerning the hunger crisis affecting the Palestinian enclave. Between March and mid-May, Israel entirely halted the flow of aid to Gaza, resulting in no food, medicine, or essential supplies such as cooking fuel entering the area. Consequently, the strip is now experiencing a severe hunger crisis that has claimed several lives.
The UN has indicated that at least 74 Palestinians have died due to hunger and malnutrition, with 63 of these fatalities occurring in July alone. Furthermore, Palestinians have reported that over 1,000 individuals have been killed while attempting to obtain food during what they describe as Israeli attacks.
The level of international outrage has reached a point where even US President Donald Trump, a staunch supporter of Israeli actions, has diverged from his usual stance, acknowledging that Gaza is indeed facing starvation and asserting that ensuring the nourishment of Gazans is his top priority.
Israeli forces detained a food convoy for two hours, according to the UN.
In a video, OCHA’s Olga Cherevka stated that Israeli forces held the food convoy for over two and a half hours at the Karem Shalom border crossing.
Highlighting the various restrictions imposed by Israel, Cherevka noted that Israel allows very little time for loading the trucks with supplies, which prevents them from securing the supplies with belts or tarps, making the supplies susceptible to falling off the vehicles on Gaza’s uneven roads.
After more than a year of Israeli bombardment, much of the Gazan landscape resembles a cratered wasteland. A UN estimate indicates that 92 percent of all buildings have been either destroyed or damaged due to Israeli attacks.
“Access must be increased. A significantly larger amount needs to be entering regularly so that communities can have confidence that supplies are forthcoming and that they will be properly distributed,” Cherevka remarked.
In the face of global condemnation regarding starvation in Gaza, Israel has declared localized ceasefires to enable the flow of aid; however, critics argue that the flow is merely a trickle and far from sufficient. Additionally, Israeli media has reported that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has convened meetings to enforce a complete blockade of Gaza once more and to annex the entire enclave.
