At least 27 Palestinians have been killed and dozens injured in an Israeli attack on people waiting for aid in southern Gaza’s Rafah governorate at an aid distribution site run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which is backed by Israel and the US, according to the enclave’s Health Ministry.
On Sunday, Palestinian and international officials reported that at least 31 people were killed and dozens more injured. On Monday, three more Palestinians were reportedly killed by Israeli fire.
Since reneging on the ceasefire deal, Israeli forces have killed at least 4,000 people in attacks targeting tents, hospitals and school-turned-shelters.
According to Palestinian health and government officials, at least 54,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces since October 2023, including more than 28,000 women and girls.
The figure also includes at least 1,400 health sector professionals, 280 UN aid workers – the highest staff death toll in UN history – and at least 180 journalists, the highest number of media workers killed in conflict since the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) began recording data in 1992.
In January, the medical journal the Lancet reported that fatalities were probably underreported by 41 percent.
The study estimated that 59.1 percent of those killed were women, children and people over the age of 65. It did not provide an estimate of Palestinian fighters among the dead.
That toll represented 2.9 percent of Gaza’s pre-war population, “or approximately one in 35 inhabitants”, the study said.
