At least 18 Palestinians have been killed after an Israeli drone strike targeted a Hamas police unit attempting to assert control over a market in the city of Deir al-Balah in central Gaza, a doctor and eyewitnesses told the BBC.
Eyewitnesses said Israeli drones fired at members of a Hamas police force, dressed in civilian clothing and wearing masks, who were confronting vendors they accused of price gouging and selling goods looted from aid trucks.
The Hamas-run Ministry of Interior condemned the strike, accusing Israel of committing “a new crime against a police unit tasked with maintaining public order”.
The BBC has contacted the Israeli military for comment.
One eyewitness told the BBC clashes broke out on Thursday after police confronted the vendors, with the unit commander shouting: “Either sell at a fair price or we will confiscate the goods.”
Some of the vendors then “pulled out handguns and one man had a Kalashnikov”, the eyewitness said.
Israeli drones then fired two missiles, local residents said.
Video footage from the aftermath shows bodies strewn on the ground and panicked shoppers screaming, as ambulances rush to attend to those injured.
A doctor at Deir al-Balah’s Al-Aqsa Hospital told the BBC 18 bodies were brought to the morgue there. It was not immediately clear how many of those killed were police officers.
The incident came as civilians in Gaza continue to struggle to access food, with near daily shootings reported at and around US and Israel-backed distribution sites in south and central Gaza, and the limited goods available in markets selling for highly inflated prices.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday accused Hamas of “once again taking control of humanitarian aid… and stealing it from civilians” in northern Gaza, as he gave the military two days to devise an “action plan” to prevent this.
It came after video footage was filmed on Wednesday of a truck convoy carrying aid into northern Gaza, after entering through the Zikim gate, with armed and masked men on top.
Israel’s far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir shared the video on social media, saying Hamas was “taking control of the food and goods” and calling on Netanyahu to halt the entry of aid into Gaza.
Hamas has denied stealing or profiting from aid, and Gaza’s higher committee for tribal affairs – a non-Hamas affiliated committee created during the war – also dismissed Israel’s “false claims” in a statement on Thursday.
“The securing of aid has been carried out purely through tribal efforts,” it said.
At a warehouse in Gaza City on Thursday, thousands of aid parcels were distributed.
Hamas political officials were present but said their role was “supervisory”, with an NGO in charge of distributing some 6,000 food parcels.
“This morning, when I woke up to the message telling me to go get aid, all my children, young and old, started singing and dancing with joy. I pray to God that this blessing remains with us,” one woman waiting for food there said.
Also on Thursday, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced its first medical shipment into Gaza since 2 March had been delivered on Wednesday.
Nine trucks carrying medical supplies, 2,000 units of blood, and 1,500 units of plasma were transported without any looting “despite the high-risk conditions”, WHO’s chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.
He added the amount was “only a drop in the ocean”.
The blood and plasma were delivered to Nasser Medical Complex for onward distribution to hospitals “facing critical shortages amid a growing influx of injuries, many linked to incidents at food distribution sites”, he said.
Before Thursday’s strike at the market, at least 14 Palestinians had been killed and dozens injured in Israeli military attacks across Gaza since midnight, a spokesperson for the Hamas-run Civil Defence said.
Rescue teams evacuated 14 bodies, including those of three Palestinians who were waiting for humanitarian aid near the Wadi Gaza bridge close to the Netzarim corridor in central Gaza.
A medical source at Al-Awda Hospital nearby confirmed that three Palestinians were killed and several others injured by Israeli gunfire near the Wadi Gaza bridge.
Witnesses said Israeli drones opened fire at a big crowd of civilians reportedly waiting for humanitarian aid at the time of the attack.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) told the BBC that overnight, a gathering was identified in an area adjacent to troops in the Netzarim corridor, and troops fired warning shots to prevent suspects from approaching them.
The IDF said it was aware of reports regarding the number of injured individuals in the area, but said an initial inquiry suggested the number does not align with the IDF’s information. However, the details of the incident are under additional review, the IDF added.
Elsewhere, five people were killed in an Israeli air strike on a school sheltering displaced families in western Gaza City.
In the Al-Mawasi area of Khan Younis, in the south of the Strip, five members of the Abu Arab family were killed when an Israeli air strike hit a tent sheltering displaced persons. Another Palestinian was also killed in a strike that hit a tent in Al-Mawasi.
Others were wounded in the strikes.
The IDF said it was looking into these reports, but requested specific coordinates and times. In general, the IDF said it was “operating to dismantle Hamas military capabilities”.
The Israeli military launched a campaign in Gaza in response to Hamas’s 7 October 2023 attack on Israel, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.
At least 56,259 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.
