‘Death trap’: Israeli forces kill six aid seekers in Gaza City

Israeli forces have shot dead at least six Palestinians and wounded 83 in Gaza City as they were waiting for food and humanitarian supplies at the Kuwait Roundabout, an area where large groups of people gather for arriving aid trucks.

The attack on Thursday took place hours after at least five people were killed by an Israeli air strike on a food distribution centre in Rafah, southern Gaza, run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), which is the main humanitarian agency in Gaza.

There has been an uptick in fatal assaults by Israeli troops on crowds of starving civilians lining up for aid in recent weeks. On Monday night, Israeli forces killed 11 people waiting for food aid at the same roundabout.

Reporting from Rafah, Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud said seeking aid has become “really dangerous” in the enclave, adding that “the Kuwaiti Roundabout is now known as a death trap”.

“We heard from a hungry and largely traumatised population stranded in the Gaza Strip asking what is the purpose of getting those aid trucks into Gaza and its northern area if they’re getting shot at,” he said.

“[The Israeli aggression] also endangers the work of aid workers on the ground,” he added.

The Kuwait Roundabout is between the central area of the Gaza Strip and Gaza City, linking northern Gaza to the south.

At least 400 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks on aid deliveries.

‘Forbidden’

Sami Abu Salim, an UNRWA employee, told Al Jazeera that he felt frustrated over the attack as the employees of the aid centre in Rafah have been working around the clock to provide aid to displaced Palestinians.

“This [attacking an aid centre] is forbidden. We are an international institution,” Abu Salim said. “We take all of this [aid] to the elderly and the children.”

The facility in Rafah is one of the last operating food distribution centres in Gaza, and the UNRWA is calling for an independent inquiry into repeated Israeli attacks on the UN agency.

Rights groups say that Israel is using starvation as a weapon of war against Palestinians.

Agnes Callamard, the secretary-general of Amnesty International, slammed the global community for pretending the crisis in Gaza was of a humanitarian nature and not one engineered by Israel.

“While the international community is busy pretending Gaza is a humanitarian crisis, Israel continues to violate international law in total impunity,” she said in a post on X, referencing Israel’s attack on the UN food centre in Rafah.

“Humanitarian assistance air drop and a Gaza aid port won’t address these violations. And they won’t address engineered starvation,” she added.