Israeli strike in Gaza allegedly kills workers with World Central Kitchen charity

DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — An Israeli airstrike on a car in the Gaza Strip on Saturday killed five people, a senior Palestinian health official said.

Three of them were said to be employees of the charity World Central Kitchen, whose aid delivery efforts in the war-ravaged territory were temporarily suspended earlier this year after an Israeli strike killed seven of its workers, most of them foreigners.

World Central Kitchen could not immediately be reached for comment, and it did not mention the deaths on social media. The Israeli military said it struck a wanted militant who had been involved in the Hamas attack that sparked the war. In a later statement, it said that the alleged attacker had worked with WCK and it asked “senior officials from the international community and the WCK administration to clarify” how that had come about.

The violence in Gaza rages on even as a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah appears to be holding, despite sporadic episodes that have tested its fragility. Israel on Saturday struck what it said were Hezbollah weapons smuggling sites along Syria’s border with Lebanon.

The strike on the vehicle in Gaza was the latest in what aid agencies have described as the dangerous work of delivering aid in Gaza, where the war has sparked a humanitarian crisis that has displaced much of the territory’s 2.3 million population and triggered widespread hunger.

World Central Kitchen provides freshly prepared meals to people in need following natural disasters or to those enduring conflict. Its teams have fanned out in Gaza and across Israel and Lebanon since the war began and have often served as a lifeline for people in Gaza who have struggled to feed themselves and their families.

Palestinian health official Muneer Alboursh confirmed the strike, and an aid worker in Gaza confirmed that three killed were workers with the WCK. The aid worker spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to speak with the media.

At Nasser Hospital in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, a woman held up an employee badge bearing the WCK logo, the word “contractor” and the name of a man said to have been killed in the strike. A heap of belongings — burned phones, a watch and stickers with the WCK logo — lay splayed on the hospital floor.

Nazmi Ahmed said his nephew worked for WCK for the past year. He said he was driving to the charity’s kitchens and warehouses.

“Today, he went out as usual to work … and was targeted without prior warning and without any reason,” Ahmed said.

In April, a strike on a WCK aid convoy killed seven workers — three British citizens, Polish and Australian nationals, a Canadian-American dual national and a Palestinian. The Israeli military said the strike was a mistake.

The strike prompted an international outcry and the suspension of aid to Gaza for a a brief period by several aid groups, including WCK. Another Palestinian WCK worker was killed in August by shrapnel from an Israeli airstrike, the group said.

The war in Gaza was triggered by Hamas’ October 2023 attack, when militants killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took some 250 hostage. Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed more than 44,000 Palestinians, according to local health officials, who do not distinguish between civilians and combatants in their count but say more than half the dead were women and children.

Efforts to secure a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas have faltered repeatedly. But the U.S.- and France-brokered deal for Lebanon appears to holding after it took effect on Wednesday. Still, Israel has accused Hezbollah of violating the ceasefire and Lebanon has accused Israel of the same.

On Saturday, Israel’s military said it struck sites that had been used to smuggle weapons from Syria to Lebanon after the ceasefire took effect, which the military called a violation of its terms. There was no immediate comment from Syrian authorities or activists monitoring the conflict in that country. Hezbollah did not immediately comment. Israeli aircraft have struck Hezbollah targets in Lebanon, citing ceasefire violations, several times since the truce began.

The Israeli strike in Syria came as insurgents there breached the country’s largest city, Aleppo, in a shock offensive that added fresh uncertainty to a region reeling from multiple wars.

The truce between Israel and the Iran-backed Hezbollah calls for an initial two-month ceasefire in which the militants are to withdraw north of Lebanon’s Litani River and Israeli forces are to return to their side of the border.

Many Lebanese, some of the 1.2 million displaced in the conflict, were streaming south to their homes, despite warnings by the Israeli and Lebanese militaries to stay away from certain areas.

Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency reported that an Israeli drone attacked a car in the southern village of Majdal Zoun. Lebanon’s Health Ministry said three people were wounded, including a 7-year-old child. Majdal Zoun, near the Mediterranean Sea, is close to where Israeli troops still have a presence.

Israel’s military said earlier Saturday that its forces, who remain in southern Lebanon until they withdraw gradually over the 60-day ceasefire period, had been operating to distance “suspects” in the region, without elaborating, and said troops had located and seized weapons found hidden in a mosque.

Israel says it reserves the right under the ceasefire to strike against any perceived violations. Israel has made returning the tens of thousands of displaced Israelis home the goal of the war with Hezbollah but Israelis, concerned that Hezbollah has not been deterred and could still attack northern communities, have been apprehensive about returning home.

Hezbollah began attacking Israel on Oct. 8, 2023, in solidarity with the Palestinian militant group Hamas and its assault on southern Israel the day before. Israel and Hezbollah kept up a low-level conflict of cross-border fire for nearly a year, until Israel escalated its fight with a sophisticated attack that detonated hundreds of pagers and walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah fighters. It followed that up with an intense aerial bombardment campaign against Hezbollah assets, killing many of its top leaders including longtime chief Hassan Nasrallah, and it launched a ground invasion in early October.

More than 3,760 people have been killed by Israeli fire in Lebanon during the conflict, many of them civilians, according to Lebanese health officials. The fighting killed more than 70 people in Israel — over half of them civilians — as well as dozens of Israeli soldiers fighting in southern Lebanon.

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Goldenberg reported from Tel Aviv, Israel, and Mroue reported from Beirut. Mohammad Jahjouh in Khan Younis, Gaza Strip, contributed.

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