Israel-Hamas war: What do we know about Gaza aid delivery chaos

  • 6 months ago

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Transcript
00:00 A convoy of three ships carrying some 400 tons of aid has left Cyprus bound for Gaza.
00:06 It will be the second shipment of aid to reach the enclave by sea after a first ship over
00:11 two weeks ago now.
00:12 And it comes as the Palestinian Red Crescent reported another deadly aid delivery in northern
00:18 Gaza this Saturday.
00:19 At least five people were killed and dozens wounded by gunfire and a stampede as thousands
00:24 gathered for the arrival of aid trucks.
00:27 The UN, EU and others have accused Israel of orchestrating a man-made famine in Gaza,
00:33 charges that Israel denies.
00:35 For more, I'm joined by our international affairs editor, Kitavan Gorgastani.
00:39 Kitavan, what do we know about this latest deadly aid incident?
00:43 Well we know very little and what we know comes from the Red Crescent who is on the
00:48 ground there.
00:49 You mentioned at least five dead, dozens more injured in this incident.
00:54 That involved, as you said, both gunfire and a stampede.
00:57 And according to some of the eyewitnesses that have been quoted in some of the reports,
01:03 the eyewitnesses talked about possibly shots fired both by Palestinians who were overseeing
01:09 the spread of that aid in northern Gaza, but also from Israeli forces.
01:16 So it's really unclear exactly what the events were like, how they unfolded, but there seems
01:23 to have been shots fired and a stampede.
01:26 And according to some of the reports coming out of the hospitals, there were people with
01:31 gunshot wounds and also people who had been trampled.
01:35 But what has happened here is unfortunately not the first time we're seeing such chaos
01:40 around the delivery of aid.
01:42 The most notable event, of course, was about a month ago when more than a hundred people
01:47 died in similar circumstances where you had both shots fired and a stampede.
01:54 It also shows how difficult it is to get aid to the people who need it the most.
01:59 There's one thing to get it on the ground.
02:01 There's another thing, which is to distribute it to the people who need it.
02:05 That's why you're seeing, as you were mentioning, those shipments coming in from the sea.
02:09 Also those airdrops would come with their own risks.
02:13 You saw some people being killed by the drop of some of these pallets, others drowning
02:18 as they were trying to retrieve some of that food from the water.
02:23 One thing that also has to be noted for our viewers is that the reason why we have so
02:28 few details as to what exactly is happening is that there are very few independent journalists
02:34 on the ground in Gaza.
02:35 There are few freelance locals, Palestinians, who are both living through these bombardments
02:42 and also trying to report and send media organizations around the world those images that we're
02:47 seeing.
02:48 And the few international foreign reporters who get in usually go in embedded with the
02:53 Israeli forces.
02:54 And that really creates a sort of information vacuum, which is why we have difficulty with
03:00 other media organizations really confirming what exactly is happening.

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