Thousands came out, camping along the coastal road in the cold Gaza night – building small fires to keep warm – huddled together waiting for supplies to come in so they could feed their families.
What they faced was death and injury as Israeli forces opened fire on hungry, desperate Palestinians who rushed forward when aid trucks finally arrived in the pre-dawn darkness Thursday, according to three eyewitnesses and a doctor who treated the wounded. .
“I saw things I never thought I would see,” said Mohammed Al-Sholi, who had camped overnight to find food for his family. “I saw people fall to the ground after being shot and others just took the food they had with them and kept running for their lives.”
More than 100 Palestinians were killed on Thursday morning, Gaza health officials said, when Israeli forces opened fire as huge crowds of people crowded around aid trucks.
An Israeli military spokesman, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, acknowledged that Israeli troops opened fire “when a mob moved in a way that put them at risk” without elaborating. But he denied that soldiers had fired at people trying to get food. “We did not shoot at those asking for help, despite the accusations,” he said. Most of the deaths were caused by trampling in the stampede, Admiral Hagari said, and some people were hit by aid trucks.
The convoy of trucks was large and it was difficult to determine what happened in the dark at different locations. But Mr. Al-Soli and two other witnesses said in telephone interviews that they saw Israeli forces firing directly at people as they tried to reach the convoy. Mr Al-Sholi said he also saw some people being hit by the trucks in the chaos. A doctor at a nearby hospital described seeing dozens of people with gunshot wounds.
Huge groups of people have camped out for aid or run in convoys in recent weeks, hoping for some relief from the severe hunger that has gripped northern Gaza during nearly five months of an Israeli offensive that has included heavy shelling, siege and ground invasion.
Mr Al-Sholi, a 34-year-old taxi driver, said he was forced to join the thousands of people who gathered near the Nabulsi roundabout in Gaza City because he and his family, including three young children, were surviving on little but spices, ground wheat and wild grasses they can find.
On Wednesday, he had heard that people had received bags of flour from aid trucks and there were rumors that another convoy was coming. So on Thursday, around 7pm, he went to the Nabulsi roundabout with friends to wait.
He said he had never seen so many people gathered in one place. Others described tens of thousands of people waiting.
“Just before the trucks arrived, a tank started moving towards us, it was around 3:30 am. and fired a few shots into the air,” Mr. Al-Soli said in a telephone interview. “That tank fired at least one shell. It was dark and I ran back to a damaged building and took shelter there.”
When aid trucks arrived soon after, people ran towards them in desperation and the shooting began, witnesses said.
“As usual, when the aid trucks arrived, people ran to them to get food and drink and whatever else they could,” said Mohammad Hamoudeh, a photographer in Gaza City. But when the people reached the trucks, he said, “the tanks started shooting directly at the people.”
He added, “I saw them firing machine guns directly.”
Mr Hamoudeh said that despite the fear and panic at the scene, many still rushed to get supplies. “People were terrified, but not all, there were those who risked dying just to get food,” he said. “They just want to live.”
Witnesses said the tanks fired shells at the people even after they started running away. They said tanks arrived between 3 and 4 a.m. and began firing regularly into Gaza, stopping around 7 a.m.
The Israeli military did not respond to questions about whether Israeli tanks opened fire before or after the aid trucks arrived. Admiral Hagari said the trucks had approached Gaza City around 4:45 a.m.
Some drone footage released by the Israeli military, along with social media footage of the scene analyzed by the New York Times, do not fully explain the sequence of events. Videos show panic, including people ducking for cover and grabbing food from trucks.
Mr Al-Sholi described chaos as he ran from aid trucks and people around him were beaten.
“I saw people falling to the ground,” Mr Al-Soli said. “The man next to me was shot in the hand with a bullet and lost his finger instantly.”
As he fled, he said, he saw about 30 people on the ground, either killed or injured. One of the dead was his cousin, who was shot while running with a bag of flour, he said. About 150 meters away from one of the tanks, he recalled seeing a boy, about 12 years old, lying on the ground with his face covered in blood.
A third witness, a journalist who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals from the Israeli army, said the Israeli fire was so intense that it was difficult to reach the wounded.
None of the witnesses reported seeing people trampled to death. Mr Al-Sholi said he saw some people hit by trucks. On Thursday, a doctor who went to the scene, Yehia Al Masri, said he saw dozens of people with gunshot wounds, but also people who appeared to have died in the stampede or been hit by aid trucks.
The tanks stopped firing around 7 am, but did not retreat. People began dragging or carrying the dead and wounded, saying the Muslim declaration of faith as they did so for fear the tanks would start firing again, Mr Hamoudeh said.
Ambulances were gathered about a mile away, unable to get any closer for fear of being shot by Israeli forces. Some carried or brought the wounded on donkeys or took them to the hospitals themselves.
About 150 injured and 12 of those killed arrived at Kamal Adwan Hospital, said Dr. Eid Sabbah, head of the nursing service there. He said about 95 percent of the injuries were gunshots to the chest and abdomen.
Many of the injured were in critical condition and required surgery. But the hospital, like the few others still operating in Gaza, suffered from shortages of electricity, fuel, medical equipment and medicine.
Medical staff were only able to perform 20 operations, with painkillers but no anesthesia, in their three well-equipped operating rooms, Dr. Sabah said. Like food supplies, medical aid has become scarce over the past four months, leaving the few hospitals still operating struggling to treat patients beyond first aid.
Dr. Sabbah warned that many of those injured in Thursday’s shootings could not receive proper treatment at their hospital.
“In the ICU there are patients who need specializations and drugs and who need complex surgeries,” he said. “Their only hope is to be taken out of Gaza to receive treatment.”
Nader Ibrahim contributed to the report.
