UN agency says aid warehouse 'hit' in Gaza, wounding scores

The United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees said one of its aid warehouses in the war-ravaged Gaza Strip was “hit” on Wednesday, wounding scores of people.

“We can confirm that an UNRWA warehouse/distribution centre in Rafah (southern Gaza) has been hit,” agency spokeswoman Juliette Touma told AFP, adding there were “scores injured”.

“We do not yet have more information on what exactly happened nor the number of UNRWA staff impacted,” she said.

“UNRWA uses this facility to distribute much-needed food and other lifesaving items to displaced people in southern Gaza.”

The health ministry in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip said four people were killed in the “bombing of the warehouse”.

An AFP photographer saw victims of the incident arriving at Al-Najjar hospital in Rafah, at least one of whom was identified by other people at the hospital as a UN employee.

Wednesday’s incident comes amid mounting concern about worsening humanitarian conditions in Gaza, where Israel has carried out military operations since October intended to eliminate the Hamas militant group.

The war was triggered by Hamas’s unprecedented October 7 attack on southern Israel, which resulted in the deaths of about 1,160 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.

Israel’s retaliatory military campaign in Gaza has killed at least 31,272 people, mostly women in children, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory.

As of March 4, a total of 162 UNRWA employees had been killed since the beginning of the Israel-Hamas war.

Gaza’s dire food shortages after more than five months of war have resulted in 27 deaths from malnutrition and dehydration, most of them children, the ministry says.

Cumbersome Israeli security checks on all cargoes entering the territory slow down the delivery of aid, and some trucks are sent back when they are found to contain forbidden items, aid workers say.

Israeli authorities say bottlenecks are caused by aid piling up on the Palestinian side as there are not enough trucks to distribute it.