The Palestinian resistance movement Hamas says the newly established aid distribution sites run by the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) in the besieged Gaza Strip have become “death traps” for starving civilians and a displacement tool.
In a statement released on Tuesday, labeling the aid distribution operation as the “Israeli-American mechanism”, Hamas said the process had become “a trap of death and humiliation.”
“Targeting the hungry while they are searching for sustenance reveals the nature of this fascist enemy, which uses hunger and bombing as weapons of killing and displacement, as part of a systematic plan to empty Gaza of its population,” the statement read.
The group said its goal was not to provide relief to the residents of the besieged Palestinian region.
“Its goal is not relief, but rather to break the dignity of our people and turn the lives of those under siege into hell, serving the purposes of forced displacement,” it said.
Elsewhere in the statement, Hamas called on the United Nations, the Security Council, and international relief organizations “to take immediate action to halt this deadly mechanism and save what remains of our besieged people.”
Separately in a statement posted on Telegram, the Palestinian Mujahideen Movement condemned what it calls a “Zionist-American crime” following the killing of Palestinians attempting to collect aid in Gaza.
The Palestinian group accused Israel and its US backers of carrying out a deliberate campaign of persecution.
“The attack reflects “a systematic policy of persecuting our people and practising the most heinous forms of oppression and injustice against them.”
The group also blasted international silence over Israel’s ongoing siege and starvation tactics in Gaza.
It said global powers are complicit in “genocide and ethnic cleansing”. It also pointed to what it called the latest atrocity — “the heinous Zionist massacre of starving and besieged people as they were heading to receive aid in the al-Mawasi area of Rafah”.
The comments come as outrage grows over repeated Israeli attacks on civilians seeking food and water, with little international accountability.
Early on Sunday morning, Israeli forces opened fire on a GHF site in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, killing at least 40 people and injuring 150 others.
Soon after, a Palestinian was reported killed in a shooting at the GHF’s distribution point, in Gaza City, south of the so-called Netzarim Corridor.
Gaza’s Government Media Office says in less than a week, the Israeli regime has killed 50 people and wounded hundreds at GHF sites.
The US-backed aid plan has been widely criticized for its unfair and inadequate distribution system.
Analysts, activists, and aid agencies have described the US-Israeli plan for aid relief in Gaza as a “mockery” of humanitarian law.
International aid agencies have already warned that Israeli plans to control aid distribution in Gaza, including the US-backed proposal, will only add to the suffering in the devastated Palestinian territory.
The UNRWA chief, Philippe Lazzarini, recently called on Israel to lift the siege on Gaza and allow safe and unhindered access for humanitarian aid in the besieged enclave, stressing that this is the only way to avert mass starvation, including among 1 million children.
Israel’s far-right ruling coalition, led by Benjamin Netanyahu, has embraced Donald Trump’s proposals on Gaza to displace Palestinians permanently outside the territory and turn it into a seaside real-estate development.
The humanitarian crisis in Gaza has escalated dramatically since March 18, when the Israeli regime violated its ceasefire agreement with the resistance group Hamas.
According to the UN-backed Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), Gaza suffers from phase 5 famine, and nearly 71,000 children under the age of five are at risk of acute malnutrition.
