Gaza Aid contractor tells BBC that he saw that colleagues are fire from hungry Palestinians

The former security contractor controversy new assisted distribution sites in Israel and the United States have told the BBC that he witnessed several times that opened fire on hungry Palestinians who had no threat, including machine guns.

One day, he said, the guard opened a fire from a machine gun, because a group of women, children and the elderly moved too slowly from the place.

When asked to answer, GHF said the allegations were categorically false.

They sent us to a statement stating that no civilian has never been under fire at the GHF distribution.

GHF started operating in Gaza in late May, distributing limited assistance from several sites in South and Central Gaza. Then there was an 11-week total gas blockade of Israel, during which the food did not enter the territory.

The system is widely criticized for making a large number of people walk through active fighting zones to several sites. Since the launch of the GHF, Israeli forces have killed more than 400 Palestinians trying to get food assistance from their sites, the UN and local doctors say. Israel says the new distribution system stops helping with Hamas.

Continuing the description of the incident on one of the GHF sites – in which he said that the guards fired a Palestinian group – the former contractor said: “As this happened, another contractor standing on the beer, opened from 15 to 20 shots repeated by the weapon in the crowd.

“The Palestinian man sank to the ground motionless. And then another contractor who stood there was like:” Damn, I think you have. “And then they laughed at it.”

The contractor who spoke to us, provided anonymity, said the GHF executives pulled the report as a coincidence, believing that the Palestinian man could “stumble” or “tired and left”.

GHF claimed that the former contractor who made these allegations was the “dissatisfied former contractor”, which they stopped for the violation of the rules he denied. He showed that we were paid, believing that he continued to pay two weeks after leaving his post.

The man we talked to, who said he worked in all four GHF distribution places described the culture of impunity with several rules and control.

He said that the contractor does not give accurate rules and standard operating procedures, and they were told one team leader: “If you feel threatened, shoot – shoot to kill and ask questions later.”

He said the culture in the company felt that “we are going into gas, so it’s not the rules. Do what you want.”

“If the Palestinian departs from the site and does not demonstrate any hostile intentions, and we shoot them, no matter what we are mistaken, we are criminal careless,” he told me.

He told us that there was a CCTV monitoring activity on each site, and the GHF infusion so that no one was injured or shot there, there was an “absolute naked face”.

GHF said the gunfires heard on the frames shared with the BBC go with Israeli forces.

The team leaders call the Zombie -Aard gas gas, the contractor said to me: “By tilting that these people are irrelevant.”

The former contractor also stated that the Palestinians were harmful in other ways on GHF sites, for example, suffered from a staggering grenade, spraying mace or pushing the crowd into razor.

He said he himself witnessed several times, in which the Palestinians were seriously injured, including one man who had a full can of pepper in the face, and a woman who, he said, suffered with a metal part of a stunning grenade, incorrectly released into the crowd.

“This metal piece hit her directly into her head, and she sank to the ground without moving,” he said. “I don’t know when she died. I know she was unconscious and completely limped.”

Earlier this week more than 170 charities and other NGOs urged to close the GHF. Organizations, including Oxfam and rescue children, say that Israeli troops and armed groups “regularly” open the fire of the Palestinians looking for help.

Israel denies its soldiers intentionally firing the beneficiaries of help and says the GHF system provides direct help to people who need it, bypassing Hamas’s intervention.

GHF states that in five weeks he has set more than 52 million meals, and other organizations “stand helplessly when their help is looted.”

The Israeli military launched a campaign in Gaza in response to Hamas attack on October 7, 2023 on Israel, killing about 1,200 people, and another 251 took hold.

At least 57,330 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the Ministry of Health in the field of health in the territory.

Additional Hii Kleiman and Samantha Granville report