At least 26 people are reported to have been killed along the so-called Morag corridor in southern Gaza on Tuesday, AP writes with reference to medical sources. It is an Israeli military zone where many of the UN's trucks with emergency aid are let through and past crowds that desperately try to get food.
The Israeli military (IDF) tells AFP that "warning shots" have been fired in the direction of a crowd that approached its forces in the area. It is in line with the military's statements in similar incidents.
Carrying bodies and flour
Gaza resident Sim Arafat, father of seven, tells AP that crowds rushed towards a UN convoy in the area early on Tuesday and that Israeli forces opened fire.
The area is completely in ruins. There are no buildings that can protect us from the shooting, he says.
Men armed with knives were first on board the trucks and looted the cargo of sugar, a commodity that can be sold on at a high price, according to Arafat. Cheaper products such as rice were left to other desperate people, who risked their lives to get food.
Many killed in the north
A further 20 are reported to have been killed and 100 injured by Israeli fire in northern Gaza near the Zikim border crossing, according to the Hamas-controlled civil defense. Israel has allowed some emergency aid to enter from there in recent weeks.
An AFP journalist reports that he has seen at least a dozen bodies taken to Hamad hospital in northern Gaza, where medical staff say they were killed in the incident near Zikim. The IDF tells AFP that they are investigating the reports.
Six people were also killed in Teina, near a road that leads to a distribution point belonging to the American Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) in southern Gaza, according to records from Nasser Hospital, which received the bodies. A further six were killed near another of GHF's distribution points, according to al-Awda Hospital in central Gaza.
In the spring, Israel introduced a nearly three-month total blockade of emergency aid to Gaza, and even after that, far from enough food and supplies have been let in.
