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UN: Over 600 Palestinian aid seekers killed in Gaza

Iran Press TV

Friday, 04 July 2025 4:03 PM

The United Nations human rights office says at least 613 Palestinian aid seekers have been killed in Gaza, mostly at sites run by the controversial Israeli and US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).

"This is a figure as of June 27. Since then ... there have been further incidents," Ravina Shamdasani, the spokesperson for the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), told reporters in Geneva on Friday.

The OHCHR said 509 of the 613 people were killed near GHF distribution points, confirming that the US-Israeli scheme is deadly. Still, the toll is lower than figures given by the Palestinian Health Ministry, which stated that more than 650 were killed and over 4,000 wounded.

The GHF has been tasked by the Israeli regime and the US government to distribute aid in Gaza since late May. Its operations, however, have been stymied by chaotic scenes and daily reports of Israeli forces firing on aid seekers waiting to collect rations from GHF installations.

The UN's Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) has described the distribution sites run by the GHF as "death traps" for starving civilians in the blockaded territory.

Mahmoud Basal, a civil defense spokesperson in Gaza, said they "recorded evidence of civilians being deliberately killed by the Israeli military".

"More than 600 Palestinian civilians were killed at these centers," he said. "Some were shot by Israeli snipers, others were killed by drone attacks, air strikes or shootings targeting families seeking aid."

A new report by the Associated Press (AP) on Wednesday have also detailed how American contractors guarding the aid centers used live ammunition, stun grenades and pepper spray against the Palestinian aid seekers.

Former EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell on Thursday said US-linked armed groups have killed hundreds of starving Palestinian aid seekers, decrying the European Union over its inaction on the crimes committed in Gaza.

Nearly 170 non-governmental organizations have called for the immediate discontinuation of the controversial Israel-US-backed program of the GHF, and called for a return to the UN-led aid mechanism that existed in the war-torn territory until March, when the Israeli regime imposed a full blockade on humanitarian assistance entering Gaza.

Since dawn on Friday, at least 41 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli raids on several areas in Gaza, according to medical sources.

Israel launched the campaign of genocide in Gaza on October 7, 2023. It has killed at least 57,130 Palestinians there so far, according to the health ministry of Gaza.