“Indiscriminate”: Eyewitness Says Israeli Forces and American Mercenaries Fire at Starving Palestinians Seeking Aid at GHF Sites
Gaza (Quds News Network)- A new eyewitness has confirmed that Israeli forces and American mercenaries fire "indiscriminately" at starving Palestinians seeking food near or at aid sites run by the controversial US- and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).
CBS News spoke to the new eyewitness, known as Mike, who said it's not just the Israeli forces firing at Palestinians, but also American mercenaries.
When asked whether he thought they were warning shots, Mike said, "No, it's indiscriminate." He said both the Israeli forces and American security personnel were shooting.
He secretly recorded videos and shared them with CBS News. You can hear gunfire in the videos, which Mike says was fired at Palestinians seeking aid.
"It took me two or three days to realize that they were actually shooting at people, they weren't shooting at combatants," he said, adding there was not a single occasion he observed when there was no shooting, and he was at the sites on average five days a week for several weeks.
When asked about the worst thing he experienced, Mike said he was once tasked by the American mercenaries with cleaning up human and animal remains adjacent to one site while on the job, due to the foul smell emitted by those remains.
"I struggle to talk about it," he said. "I even feel a bit clammy, and I can feel my chest beating harder. I just shut down really."
Referring to the mercenaries, Mike said, "They would often boast about how many people they've killed, if they've managed to shoot animals.. or how many birds they'd shot because they were bragging about how good their aim was."
Mike is home now and won't be going back. He said, “These atrocities don't have to happen.”
After more than 80 days of total blockade, starvation, and growing international outrage, limited aid has allegedly been distributed by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a scandal-plagued organization backed by the US and Israel, created to bypass the UN’s established aid delivery infrastructure in the Gaza Strip.
Most humanitarian organisations, including the UN, have distanced themselves from GHF, arguing that the group violates humanitarian principles by restricting aid to south and central Gaza, requiring Palestinians to walk long distances to collect aid, and only providing limited aid, among other critiques. They have also said the model would increase forced displacement in Gaza.
Palestinians in Gaza and the UN described these sites as “mass death traps” and “slaughterhouses”.
Human Rights Watch stated that Israel’s killing of aid seekers at GHF sites amounts to war crimes.
More than 1,800 Palestinian aid seekers have been killed trying to get food, at least 1,000 in the vicinity of GHF sites, according to the UN’s Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Since GHF started operating aid sites in May, there have been reports on near-daily shootings at or near GHF sites, starving aid seekers in Gaza and former US mercenaries have spoken out about witnessing gunfire against Palestinian crowds in interviews with news outlets.
According to Israeli newspaper Haaretz on Thursday, the army said the death toll of around 71,000 killed in Gaza is largely correct, adding that it did not include those missing and buried under the rubble.