25 countries call for ‘immediate’ end to Gaza war, citing mounting death toll at aid distribution sites

JTA  – At least 85 Palestinians were killed while trying to reach aid in the Gaza Strip on Sunday, 20 July, marking the deadliest day for aid seekers in the region as aid sites have faced a nearly daily toll of killings, according to the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry.

The incident comes amid a steady drumbeat of killings at aid sites in the enclave where Israel has been battling Hamas for more than 21 months. More than 1 000 Gazans have been killed while seeking aid since the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a United States-Israeli mechanism to deliver aid in Gaza and bypass Hamas, began operating last month.

The foreign ministers of 25 countries cited the dangers of the aid distribution system in calling for an immediate end to the war in a statement released on Monday afternoon, 21 July.

“We, the signatories listed below, come together with a simple, urgent message: the war in Gaza must end now,” they said. “The suffering of civilians in Gaza has reached new depths. The Israeli government’s aid delivery model is dangerous, fuels instability, and deprives Gazans of human dignity.”

The statement was signed by the foreign ministers of Australia; Austria; Belgium; Canada; Denmark; Estonia; Finland; France; Iceland; Ireland; Italy; Japan; Latvia; Lithuania; Luxembourg; The Netherlands; New Zealand; Norway; Poland; Portugal; Slovenia; Spain; Sweden; Switzerland; and the United Kingdom.

Israel has acknowledged firing “warning shots” during some of the incidents, saying that its soldiers perceived threats, but has disputed the death toll cited by the Gaza health ministry. It hasn’t offered alternative tallies of casualties at the aid sites, which are among the only places where Gazans can obtain basic supplies.

First-person testimonies of people who have sought aid from the sites portray a harrowing experience undertaken by an increasingly desperate population.

“Suddenly, tanks surrounded us and trapped us as gunshots and strikes rained down. We were trapped for about two hours,” Ehab Al-Zei, who had been waiting for flour at the crossing, told The Times of Israel. “I will never go back again. Let us die of hunger. It’s better.”

In one first-hand account of the challenges faced by Palestinians seeking aid shared on Instagram, a user by the name of Moh Zraiy described sleeping under a bridge near an aid site in Netzarim as he and a group of aid seekers waited for Israeli tanks to withdraw from the site, then being robbed of his first box.

Later, after he walked nearly 10 miles (16km) home with flour, oil, chickpeas, and pasta, he saw that some had been killed at the site. “Leaving home with your family dreaming you’d return with a bag of flour, but you return as a corpse,” he wrote.

In a video shared on Instagram last week by Standing Together, the joint Jewish-Arab left-wing activist group, a large crowd of Palestinians allegedly near an aid distribution centre can be seen cowering as ammunition is fired nearby.

The mass killings on Sunday come as aid distribution throughout Gaza have faced near-daily shootings and disruptions. Last month, some Israeli soldiers and officers told the newspaper Haaretz that they were ordered to shoot indiscriminately at people seeking aid as a method of dispersal.

Many of the deaths near aid sites have taken place at sites operated by the GHF, which said it had no ties to the killings on Sunday.

“Like most violent incidents, this incident is not linked to GHF, despite what was falsely implied by Al Jazeera,” the foundation wrote in a post on X. “These tragedies deserve visibility. The entire aid system is under immense strain.”

The majority of the killings on Sunday took place in northern Gaza, where crowds of Palestinians had gathered to receive aid from a convoy of 25 United Nations (UN) aid trucks that had entered Gaza through the Zikim Crossing.

After passing the final checkpoint, the trucks encountered “large crowds of civilians anxiously waiting to access desperately needed food supplies”, according to the UN-operated World Food Programme, which then “came under fire from Israeli tanks, snipers, and other gunfire”.

In a statement on Sunday, the World Food Programme condemned the Israeli military’s continued armed presence near aid distribution sites, writing that “any violence involving civilians seeking humanitarian aid is completely unacceptable”.

More than 150 people were also wounded on Sunday, with some of them in critical condition, according to tolls cited by the Associated Press.

Hours after the incidents, Avichay Adraee, the Israel Defense Force’s (IDF’s) Arabic-language spokesperson, posted a video on X that he said depicted Israeli soldiers holding fire as hundreds of Palestinians approached a truck carrying aid.

“Not a single shot was fired. The order was clear: do not open fire. And the Palestinians’ reaction? It wasn’t fear … it was hope. Civilians began welcoming and cheering our soldiers,” Adraee said.

The mass killings on Sunday also come as the IDF has issued an evacuation order for Palestinians in Deir al-Balah, a city in the centre of the Gaza Strip, for the first time since the start of the war.

The World Central Kitchen, another organisation involved in aid distribution, also announced on Sunday that it had depleted all of its supplies and that its aid trucks were currently stuck at the Gaza border. As a result, the organisation was forced to halt its operations in kitchens in Gaza that were serving hot meals.

The pause comes as Israel has been accused by aid groups of blocking deliveries. Last month, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stopped aid from entering northern Gaza for two days due to video evidence that allegedly showed Hamas fighters stealing food from civilians.

“Our field kitchens are prepped and ready to resume cooking the moment new supplies arrive,” the World Central Kitchen wrote in a statement. “Every second counts. Families in Gaza rely on these hot meals.”