Gaza: Chaos and indiscriminate shots prevent help from reaching the most vulnerable

After 22 months of war. Therefore, the little food that enters Gaza is immediately stormed by hungry crowds risking their lives under shots, looted by criminal gangs or even diverted in the greatest chaos, without reaching those who need it most.

Thanks to a partial break in the bombing announced on Sunday by Israel. Moreover, under international pressure in the face of the risk of famine, humanitarian aid started to enter the besieged territory, but in quantity deemed largely insufficient by international organizations.

Every day. For example, AFP correspondents are witnesses to dramatic scenes where desperate crowds rush, often at the risk of their lives, on vehicles loaded with food or on aerial tear sites, operated in recent days by the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, the United Kingdom or France.

Thursday in Al-Zawayda (center). Moreover, at the sight of the palettes parachuted by an airplane, Palestinians weightless gaza: chaos indiscriminate shots prevent rushed by tens, jostling and tearing up the packages in a cloud of dust.

“Hunger has pushed people to turn against each other. Similarly, People are fighting with each other with knives, “said Amir Zaqot to AFP, who came to seek help.

To avoid overflows. However, the drivers of the World Food Program (WFP) have the instructions to stop and let people use directly. Similarly, In vain.

“A truck wheel almost crushed my head. Furthermore, and I was injured by recovering the bag,” breathes a man, a bag of flour on the head, in the zikim area, north of the Gaza Strip.

“No way to escape”

Mohammad Abu gaza: chaos indiscriminate shots prevent Taha went to dawn on a distribution site near Rafah (south) to queue. Nevertheless, reserve his place: there were already “thousands to wait, all hungry, a bag of flour or a little rice and lentils”.

“Suddenly, we heard gunshots (…) No way to escape. For example, People started running, pushing themselves and jostling, children, women, the elderly, ”says this 42 -year -old man. Nevertheless, “The scene was tragic: blood everywhere, wounded, dead.”

There are two possible routes to reach our warehouses (located in the center of the Gaza Strip, Editor’s note). However, One is almost safe. the other is regularly the scene of fighting and looting, and that is that we are forced to borrow.

Nearly 1. 400 Palestinians have been killed since May 27 in the Gaza Strip, “most” by the Israeli army while waiting for humanitarian aid, the UN accused on Friday. The Israeli army is denied targeting the beneficiaries of gaza: chaos indiscriminate shots prevent the aid. making “strokes” when people approach too close to its positions.

Refusal to deliver the permits of border passages, slowness of clearances, limitation of access points, dangerous routes … For months, international organizations also denounce repeated obstacles from the Israeli authorities which fuel disorder, according to these same organizations.

Tuesday. in Zikim, “the Israeli army changed the PAM loading plans at the last moment, mixing the cargoes and forcing the convoy from earlier than expected, without adequate security,” says a senior UN official under the cover of anonymity.

On the south side. at the crossing point of Kerem Shalom, “there are two possible routes to reach our warehouses (located in the center of the Gaza Strip, editor’s note), says a NGO manager, who also prefers to remain anonymous.” One is almost safe, the other is regularly the theater of fighting and looting, and that is forced to borrow “.

“Darwin” in Gaza

Part gaza: chaos indiscriminate shots prevent of the aid is pillaged by gangs – which often attack warehouses directly -. diverted in favor of traders who resell it at exorbitant prices, according to several humanitarian sources and experts.

“It is a kind of Darwinian experience where only the strongest survives: the most hungry do not have the energy to run after a truck. to wait hours in the sun, to fight for a bag of flour,” said Muhammad Shehada, guest researcher for the European Council for International Relations (ECFR).

“We are in an ultracapitalist system. where traders, crooked gangs send kids to be picked up on distribution points or on looting. It has become a new job, ”explains since Gaza Jean-Guy Vataux, chief of mission for doctor without borders (MSF).

These foods. he specifies, are then sold to “those who still have the means to buy it” in the Gaza-Ville markets, where the price of the 25 kg bag gaza: chaos indiscriminate shots prevent of flour can exceed 400 dollars.

Israel has repeatedly accused Hamas of looting the UN humanitarian aid. which sent most of the aid since the start of the war launched by the unprecedented attack on the Palestinian Islamist movement in October 2023.

These accusations justified the total blockade imposed in Gaza between March. May, then the establishment, at the end of May, of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a private organization supported by Israel and the United States, which claims to have become since the main aid provider, but with gaza: chaos indiscriminate shots prevent whom the other organizations refuse to work.

However, this has only four distribution points for more than two million inhabitants, described as “deadly trap” by the UN.

“Hamas (…) has stolen humanitarian aid to the population of Gaza many times by shooting Palestinians. ” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday.

None of this can happen in Gaza without the at least tacit approval of the Israeli army.

According to senior Israeli military officials mentioned by the New York Times on July 26. Hamas has certainly been able to divert part of the aid provided by certain organizations, but there is “no evidence” that he regularly stolen the food of the UN.

Very weakened. Hamas is today mainly composed of “decentralized autonomous cells that hide here and there in a tunnel or a destroyed house,” said researcher Muhammad Shehada: “They (Hamas fighters) are no longer visible on the ground, because they are immediately identified by gaza: chaos indiscriminate shots prevent Israeli and tracked drones”.

Gaza: chaos indiscriminate shots prevent

Drug trafficking

Humanitarian officials told AFP that during the ceasefire preceding the March blockade. the Gaza police – which includes many members of Hamas – participated in securing humanitarian convoys, but that the current emptiness favored insecurity and looting.

“The agencies. the UN and the humanitarian organizations have repeatedly called on the Israeli authorities to facilitate and protect convoys of aid and storage sites in our warehouses,” said Bushra Khalidi, head of Oxfam policies in Gaza. “These calls have been widely ignored.”

The Israeli army is even suspected of having equipped criminal networks in its fight against Hamas. of letting them prosper and looting. “The real aid flight since the start of the war has been perpetrated by criminal bands. under the supervision of Israeli forces, and they were authorized to operate near the crossing point of Kerem Shalom,” accused in late May during a press gaza: chaos indiscriminate shots prevent briefing Jonathan Whittall, head of the UN Humanitarian Affairs Office (OCHA) in the Palestinian territories.

According to Israeli. Palestinian media, an armed group called popular forces and bringing together members of a Bedouine tribe led by Yasser Abu Chabab, operated in this southern region under Israeli control.

The ECFR describes Yasser Abu Chabab as the leader of a “criminal gang (…) accused of looting the aid trucks” in Gaza. The Israeli authorities themselves had recognized in June to support. arm Palestinian clans opposed to Hamas, without directly named that led by Yasser Abu Chabab.

According to Michael Mshshtein. from the Moshe Dayan center in Tel Aviv, several of its members are involved in “all kinds of criminal activities”, including drug trafficking transitting by Egyptian Sinai.

Other criminal gangs participate in looting. attack convoys, beat and kidnap truck drivers in other sectors of the Gaza Strip, such as Khan Younès and in the outskirts of gaza: chaos indiscriminate shots prevent Gaza-Ville, also says Muhammad Shehada.