Charity urges US- and Israel-supported Gaza support groups to close | Israeli-Palestinian conflict news

More than 130 humanitarian organisations, including Oxfam, Save the Children and Amnesty International, have called for the immediate closure of the Israeli- and US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), accusing them of promoting attacks on hungry Palestinians.

In a joint statement released Tuesday, the NGO said Israeli forces and armed groups would fire “on a daily basis” at civilians seeking access to food.

Since the GHF launched its operation in late May, more than 500 Palestinians have been killed and nearly 4,000 injured while seeking assistance, the group reported.

They accused the mechanism of aid as a violation of humanitarian norms, leaking Gaza’s 2.2 million residents into overcrowded, militarized distribution zones and being exposed to near-daily gunfire.

“Palestinians in Gaza face an impossible choice. They run the risk of starving or being shot while desperately trying to reach food to feed their families,” the statement said. “Orphan children and caregivers are among the dead. The children were hurt by more than half of the attacks on civilians on these sites.”

Since its launch, GHF has replaced over 400 localized distribution points. This was working in a short ceasefire, so it was only four centralized sites under Israeli military control, three in the southwest and one in the center of Gaza.

“In a state of serious hunger and hunger, many families say they are too weak to compete for food products now,” the NGO said.

“Israel Agenda”

Palestinian civil society leader Amjad Shawa spoke with Al Jazeera of Gaza city and said the aid mechanisms are not providing adequate supplies for hungry families and are putting pressure on people to move towards South Gaza.

“They deliver some of the food that is enough to last for a few days, including some energy bars, oil, rice, flour, and more,” he said. “This is not a proper diet. There is a risk of deepening Gaza’s malnutrition.”

Shawa argued that placing GHF distribution points primarily in the southern and eastern Gaza reflects a deliberate strategy to drive people out of the north, in cooperation with the broader Israeli military goals. “It’s a calculated effort to push the Palestinians further south,” he said.

UN agencies and humanitarian leaders have repeatedly criticised the GHF model. Last week, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres named it “intrinsically unsafe.”

Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported on Friday that Israeli soldiers were ordered to shoot unarmed Palestinians near the aid site to disband them.

Reported by Deir El-Balah, Tareq Abu Azzoum of Al Jazeera said there were no attacks on those seeking assistance, saying, “The Israeli military crowd is trying to approach aid supply from the GHF, so they will kill at least 16 people and at least 16 people.” Those seeking assistance were one of at least 44 people killed in Israeli attacks across Gaza on Tuesday, medical sources told Al Jazeera.

Cerez-fire meeting

The condemnation comes when Israeli officials, including strategic minister Ron Dahmer, arrive in Washington, D.C. for a ceasefire talk. Mediator Qatar confirmed continued efforts to revive negotiations, but noted that progress was slow.

“There is momentum created by the Iran-Israel ceasefire,” said Majed Al Ansari, a spokesman for the Qatar Ministry of Foreign Affairs. “But the main obstacle is that both parties have not returned to the table.”

The Israeli military chief said last week that ground operations were approaching their targets, but Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu argued that new opportunities have emerged to restore prisoners of war held by Palestinian groups.

Meanwhile, Hamas official Osama Hamdan said on Monday that there was no contact from Israel for several weeks. “We are determined to seek a ceasefire that will save people, and we will work with mediators to open the intersection,” he said.