RAFAH, Gaza Strip — At least 31 people were killed and over 150 were wounded on Sunday while on their way to receive food in the Gaza Strip, according to health officials and multiple witnesses. The witnesses said Israeli forces fired on crowds around a kilometer (1,000 yards) from an aid site run by an Israeli-backed foundation.

The army in a brief statement said it was “currently unaware of injuries caused by (Israeli military) fire within the humanitarian aid distribution site. The matter is still under review.”

The foundation – promoted by Israel and the United States – said in a statement it delivered aid “without incident” early Sunday. It has denied previous accounts of chaos and gunfire around its sites, which are in Israeli military zones where independent access is limited.

Gaza’s Health Ministry said 31 people were killed and 170 others were wounded.

A new aid system marred by chaos

The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation ‘s aid distribution has been marred by chaos in its first week of operations, and multiple witnesses have said Israeli troops fired on crowds near its delivery sites. Before Sunday, at least six people had been killed and more than 50 wounded, according to local health officials.

The foundation says the private security contractors guarding its sites have not fired on the crowds. Israel’s military has acknowledged firing warning shots on previous occasions.

The foundation said in a statement it distributed 16 truckloads of aid early Sunday “without incident,” and dismissed what it described as “false reporting about deaths, mass injuries and chaos.”

‘The scene was horrible’

Thousands of people headed toward the distribution site in southern Gaza hours before dawn. As they approached, Israeli forces ordered them to disperse and come back later, witnesses said. When the crowds reached the Flag Roundabout, around 1 kilometer (half a mile) away, at around 3 a.m., Israeli forces opened fire, the witnesses said.

“There was fire from all directions, from naval warships, from tanks and drones,” said Amr Abu Teiba, who was in the crowd.

He said he saw at least 10 bodies with gunshot wounds and several other wounded people, including women. People used carts to ferry the dead and wounded to a field hospital. “The scene was horrible,” he said.

Most people were shot “in the upper part of their bodies, including the head, neck and chest,” said Dr. Marwan al-Hams, a health ministry official at Nasser Hospital, where many of the wounded were transferred after being brought to the field hospital run by the Red Cross.

He said 24 people were being treated in Nasser Hospital’s intensive care unit. A colleague, surgeon Khaled al-Ser, later said 150 wounded people had arrived, along with 28 bodies.

Ibrahim Abu Saoud, another witness, said the military fired from about 300 meters (yards) away.

Abu Saoud said he saw many people with gunshot wounds, including a young man who he said died at the scene. “We weren’t able to help him,” he said.

Mohammed Abu Teaima, 33, said he saw Israeli forces open fire and kill his cousin and a woman as they headed toward the distribution site. He said his cousin was shot in his chest and his brother-in-law was among the wounded.

“They opened heavy fire directly toward us,” he said.

An AP reporter arrived at the field hospital at around 6 a.m. and saw dozens of wounded, including women and children. The reporter also saw crowds of people returning from the distribution point. Some carried boxes of aid but most appeared to be empty-handed.

Officials at the field hospital said at least 21 people were killed and another 175 were wounded, without saying who opened fire on them. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to reporters.

Gaza’s Health Ministry provided the same toll and later updated it.

The UN says new aid system violates humanitarian principles

Israel and the U.S. say the new system is aimed at preventing Hamas from siphoning off assistance. Israel has not provided any evidence of systematic diversion, and the U.N. denies it has occurred.

U.N. agencies and major aid groups have refused to work with the new system, saying it violates humanitarian principles because it allows Israel to control who receives aid and forces people to relocate to distribution sites, risking yet more mass displacement in the coastal territory.

“It’s essentially engineered scarcity,” Jonathan Whittall, interim head in Gaza of the U.N. humanitarian office, said last week.

The U.N. system has struggled to bring in aid after Israel slightly eased its nearly three-month blockade of the territory last month. Those groups say Israeli restrictions, the breakdown of law and order and widespread looting make it extremely difficult to deliver aid to Gaza’s roughly 2 million Palestinians.

Experts have warned that the territory is at risk of famine if more aid is not brought in.

The war began when Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting 251. They are still holding 58 hostages, around a third believed to be alive, after most of the rest were released in ceasefire agreements or other deals.

Israel’s military campaign has killed over 54,000 people, mostly women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not say how many of the dead were civilians or combatants. The offensive has destroyed vast areas, displaced around 90% of the population and left people almost completely reliant on international aid.

The latest efforts at ceasefire talks appeared to stumble Saturday when Hamas said it had sought amendments to a U.S. ceasefire proposal that Israel had approved, and the U.S. envoy called that “unacceptable.”

Also Sunday, Israel said its forces killed the commander of a militant cell it says was behind an attack that killed 21 soldiers in the war’s early months. It was among the deadliest single events for the military in nearly 20 months of fighting, excluding Hamas’ initial onslaught. A blast from a rocket-propelled grenade fired by militants triggered explosives the soldiers were laying to blow up buildings.

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Magdy reported from Cairo. Associated Press writer Tia Goldenberg in Tel Aviv, Israel, contributed to this report.