Over 165 international organizations urge end to U.S.- and Israeli-backed Gaza aid program
(ECNS) -- More than 165 international charities and NGOs on Tuesday called for the shutdown of the U.S.- and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), describing its aid distribution system as dangerous and ineffective.
"Palestinians in Gaza face an impossible choice: starve or risk being shot while trying desperately to reach food to feed their families," the organizations, including Oxfam and Save the Children, said in the joint statement.
Israel began to allow a limited amount of humanitarian aid to enter Gaza after a nearly three-month blockade under pressure from the international community.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres on Friday called the GHF's aid distribution system "inherently unsafe", adding: "It is killing people."
Guterres said the GHF system bypasses the UN-led aid distribution network, forcing Gazans to travel long distances through dangerous areas to access food.
The organizations said Israeli forces and armed groups "routinely" open fire on Palestinians seeking aid.
UN statistics showed that since late May, over 400 people were killed near the GHF's distribution centers, while Gaza's Health Ministry claimed that more than 500 Palestinians have been killed around a widely criticized aid distribution effort over the past month and thousands of people injured.
According to a report by Israeli newspaper Haaretz on Friday, unnamed Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldiers said they were ordered to shoot at unarmed civilians near aid distribution sites to drive them away or disperse them.
The Israeli military acknowledged on Monday that Palestinian civilians were harmed at aid distribution centers in the Gaza Strip, saying that Israeli forces had been issued new instructions following what it called "lessons learned".
Both the UN and these international organizations refused to work with GHF, claiming it serves the goals of the Israeli military and violates humanitarian principles.
(By Zhang Dongfang)