Israel Katz says the so-called ‘humanitarian city’ will be built on the ruins of Rafah

by Dave DeCamp, Antiwar. com, July 7, 2025

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz has ordered the IDF to prepare a plan to establish a camp to concentrate the entire civilian population of Gaza on the ruins of the southern Gaza city of Rafah.

According to Haaretz, Katz said that once Palestinian civilians are pushed into what he is calling a “humanitarian city,” they will not be allowed to leave. The idea is to first transfer 600,000 civilians from the al-Mawasi tent camp on the coast in southern Gaza, followed by the rest of the civilian population.

Katz said that if conditions permit, the “city” could be built during a potential 60-day ceasefire, comments that will make Hamas less likely to agree to a temporary truce. The Israeli defense minister also said that during the ceasefire, Israel will maintain control of the “Morag Corridor,” a strip of land between Rafah and Khan Younis.

Katz also suggested the camp can facilitate the government’s ultimate goal of ethnic cleansing, which it refers to as “voluntary migration,” telling reporters that Israel will implement “the emigration plan, which will happen.”

Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has previously said that the goal of Israel’s current military operation, dubbed Gideon’s Chariots, is to create a concentration camp south of the Morag Corridor and pressure the civilians forced into it to leave.

“The Gazan citizens will be concentrated in the south. They will be totally despairing, understanding that there is no hope and nothing to look for in Gaza, and will be looking for relocation to begin a new life in other places,” Smotrich said in May.

Katz’s comments come after Reuters reported that the controversial US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) had proposed to the US government the idea of creating camps it called “Humanitarian Transit Areas” inside Gaza or possibly outside Gaza.

The GHF plan describes the camps as “large-scale” and “voluntary” places where the Palestinian population could “temporarily reside, deradicalize, re-integrate and prepare to relocate if they wish to do so.”

Katz said Israel is seeking “international partners” to manage the zone and that four aid distribution sites would be set up inside the camp, suggesting the GHF will be involved in the plan. GHF aid sites are secured by American security contractors, who have been credibly accused of using live ammunition and stun grenades to disperse crowds of hungry Palestinian civilians.

More than 300 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza over the past three days

by Dave DeCamp, Antiwar. com, Jul 3, 2025

Gaza’s Health Ministry said on Thursday that Israeli forces killed at least 118 Palestinians and wounded 581 over the previous 24-hour period as heavy US-backed Israeli strikes continued across the Strip and Israeli troops continued to shoot people seeking aid.

Thursday marks the third day in a row that the Health Ministry reported a death toll of more than 100. Based on the ministry’s numbers, which studies have found are likely a significant undercount, Israeli forces killed 369 Palestinians over a 72 hours.

Israeli attacks on Thursday included massacres of children. According to The Associated Press, an overnight strike on tents sheltering displaced Palestinians killed 13 members of one family, including six children under the age of 12. Two children, including a six-year-old girl, were among eight people reported killed by an Israeli strike that hit near a stand selling falafel in central Gaza.

An Israeli strike on a school sheltering displaced Palestinians in Gaza City killed 15 people. The breakdown of the casualties is unclear, but photos of the funeral for the victims at Al-Shifa Hospital show several tiny bodies wrapped in shrouds.

Medical sources told AP that five Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces along roads while attempting to reach distribution sites run by the US and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), and another 40 were killed while waiting for UN aid trucks in various parts of Gaza.

The Health Ministry said that since the GHF began operating in Gaza at the end of May, 652 Palestinians have been killed while seeking aid. The aid massacres have continued despite more attention on the issue following a report from Haaretz that revealed IDF troops had been given orders to fire on unarmed people near GHF sites.

The AP also reported that American contractors posted at the aid sites have also been using live ammunition and stun grenades to disperse civilians near the distribution sites. In at least one case, one of the contractors who spoke to AP said it appeared fire from the US contractors hit an unarmed Palestinian.

The revelations about the aid killings have not impacted US support for Israel or support for the aid mechanism that has proven to be deadly. The Trump administration recently announced it was providing $30 million to the GHF.

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At least one journalist was killed and another was injured

by Dave DeCamp, Antiwar. com, Jun 30, 2025

Medical sources told Al Jazeera on Monday that Israeli attacks killed at least 95 Palestinians in Gaza throughout the day as Israeli forces bombed a seaside cafe and gunned down more desperate people who were seeking aid.

According to the Palestinian news agency WAFA, an Israeli airstrike hit the Al-Baqa Cafe in Gaza City, killing 33 people and injuring 50 others. Among the dead was journalist Ismail Abu Hatab, bringing the total number of Palestinian journalists killed since October 7, 2023, to 227, according to WAFA’s count.

Another journalist, Bayan Abu Sultan, was wounded in the attack, and photos and videos of the aftermath show her standing outside the cafe covered in blood. Ali Abu Ateila, a survivor of the airstrike, told The Associated Press that the cafe was struck when it was crowded with women and children.

Journalist Bayan Abu Sultan, after the Israeli airstrike on the Al-Baqa Cafe in western Gaza City on June 30, 2025 (Majdi Fathi via Reuters Connect)

“Without a warning, all of a sudden, a warplane hit the place, shaking it like an earthquake,” Ateila said. The cafe was one of the few businesses that continued to operate in Gaza and was frequently crowded as Palestinians went there to charge their phones and use the internet.

The AP also reported that at least 22 people were killed by Israeli fire while attempting to get aid in different areas of Gaza. The Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis said it received 11 bodies of Palestinians who were killed while returning from an aid site operated by the US and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) in the area. Another Palestinian was killed near an aid site in Rafah.

Gaza’s Health Ministry said that another 10 people were killed at a UN warehouse in northern Gaza. The latest aid-related killings come after a report from the Israeli newspaper Haaretz revealed that Israeli troops are being ordered to fire on unarmed Palestinians attempting to reach GHF distribution sites to drive them away or disperse them, even though they pose no threat.

Israeli forces also launched heavy attacks on the Zeitoun neighborhood in Gaza City on Monday, with residents reporting that the IDF bombed four schools that were sheltering displaced people, and at least 10 Palestinians were killed in the area. “Explosions never stopped; they bombed schools and homes. It felt like earthquakes,” Salah, a 60-year-old father of five children from Gaza City, told Reuters. “In the news we hear a ceasefire is near, on the ground, we see death and we hear explosions.”

The Health Ministry said at least five Palestinians were killed on Sunday morning while seeking aid

by Dave DeCamp, Antiwar. com, June 8, 2025

Gaza’s Health Ministry said on Sunday that Israeli attacks killed at least 106 Palestinians and wounded 393 as Israeli forces continue to pound the Strip with airstrikes and shoot desperate Palestinians seeking aid.

The Health Ministry said that at least five Palestinians were killed and 123 were injured while seeking aid at distribution points run by the US and Israeli-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).

According to The Cradle, at least one Palestinian was killed by Israeli gunfire at a distribution site at the Netzarim Corridor, which separates northern Gaza from the rest of the Strip. Four were reported killed when Israeli tanks, gunboats, and snipers opened fire near a site in the southern city of Rafah. Other reports said the death toll in Rafah rose to 13.

According to Reuters, the Israeli military acknowledged that it opened fire on Palestinians near the site in Rafah, claiming its forces “had directed warning shots at a group that was moving towards soldiers and deemed a threat to them.”

The Health Ministry said that the total number of Palestinians killed en route to aid sites since the GHF began operating has reached 115, and another 1,100 have been injured.

Heavy Israeli airstrikes and shelling were also reported across Gaza. According to the Palestinian news agency WAFA, at least 31 Palestinians were killed by Israeli strikes, mainly in the southern cities of Rafah and Khan Younis, and in Gaza City and Jabalia in the north.

Also on Sunday, the Israeli military claimed that it had found and identified the body of Hamas leader Mohammed Sinwar, who it alleges was killed in a May 13 bombing outside the European Hospital in Khan Younis. Israel alleged that tunnels were underneath the facility, which Hamas has previously denied. Sinwar took over as Hamas’s leader following the killing of his brother, Yahya Sinwar, in October 2024.

Gaza’s Health Ministry said that since Israel resumed its genocidal war on March 18, at least 4,603 Palestinians have been killed, and 14,186  were injured. The numbers account for dead and wounded Palestinians brought to hospitals and morgues.

Since October 7, 2023, the ministry’s death toll has reached 54,880, and the number of wounded has climbed to 126,227, figures that don’t account for thousands missing and presumed dead under the rubble or indirect deaths caused by the Israeli siege.

Andre Damon, wsws.org, 5 June 2025

@Andre__Damon

In the week since Israel launched food distributions under the auspices of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), Israeli forces have turned the aid distributions into killing fields almost every day.

In a statement published Tuesday, the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor reported that over the past week, over 600 Palestinians have been killed or injured in Israeli attacks on crowds at the food distribution points.

Prior to the launch of the US-Israeli “aid” operation, humanitarian and human rights groups, including the UN, warned that the scheme was merely a means to lure Gaza’s remaining population to the south, where they could be trapped in concentration camps in preparation for the US-Israeli plan to ethnically cleanse Gaza by expelling its population.

It has since emerged that the purpose of the “aid” centers is even more sinister: they are launching points not only for indiscriminate massacres of aid-seekers, but for what appear to be targeted assassinations of members of the crowd. Rather than being a humanitarian lifeline, they are killing fields.

On Tuesday, Israeli forces carried out yet another massacre near an aid distribution site in Rafah, killing 27 people and injuring 90. On Monday, 3 people were killed and dozens were wounded in nearly the exact same circumstances. This followed a massacre on Sunday in which 30 people were killed and 170 were wounded.

In its report, the Euro-Med Monitor stated that, “According to testimonies and information collected by Euro-Med Monitor’s field researchers, Israeli army snipers deliberately targeted starving civilians with direct gunfire, mostly to the head, despite no apparent threat to Israeli forces.”

One survivor told the monitor, “At around 3:50 a.m. today, an Israeli quadcopter flew over and photographed the civilian crowd. Then, the army opened fire from a crane in the area. I personally carried three people who had been shot in the head. Most of the injuries were to the head. People came looking for food to ease their hunger, but they went back dead or wounded.”

In another testimony, A. B., 38, told the Euro-Med Monitor team, “Around 5:45 a.m., we managed to enter the center, and I was able to get an aid package. On my way out, I met a woman in her 40s who said she couldn’t continue forward and that she and her children were suffering from hunger and poverty. I gave her my package and returned to try to get another one, but there was nothing left. A quadcopter was overhead, broadcasting insulting remarks: ‘You animals, go away, the supply is out.’”

He continued, “As I was leaving and nearing the chute’s exit, I saw a child crying out loudly, ‘Mom, get up, Mom, get up.’ I went closer and found the woman I had given my package to lying in a pool of blood. She was dead,” he said. “A group of young men and I carried her outside and placed her in an ambulance. I accompanied her son to the hospital. On the way, along the sea road, I saw seven bodies lying on the side of the road.”

Aid-seekers attempting to access food are forced to wait in long lines before being subjected to facial recognition scans. The testimony presented by the Euro-Med Monitor could indicate that the ongoing massacres are not random killing sprees, but that the facial recognition scans are being used for targeted assassinations at the aid distribution sites.

On Wednesday, the United States vetoed a UN Security Council resolution calling for a ceasefire in Gaza – the fifth time it has done so. Fourteen other members of the Security Council voted for the ceasefire, which called the humanitarian situation in Gaza “catastrophic” and called for the lifting of restrictions on food aid.

“Israel has a right to defend itself, which includes defeating Hamas and ensuring they are never again in a position to threaten Israel,” said U.S. Ambassador Dorothy Sheato. “In this regard, any product that undermines our close ally Israel’s security is a non-starter.”

Sheato openly endorsed the so-called “Gaza Humanitarian Foundation,” declaring, “We instead urge the UN and NGOs to support the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation to help it safely deliver aid without being diverted by Hamas.” In an open embrace of the massacres as the GHF aid centers, she said the foundation is delivering aid “consistent with the humanitarian principles of humanity, neutrality, impartiality, and independence.”

The UN vetoed a similarly worded UN Security Council resolution under the Biden administration, using essentially the same rationalization.

Riyad Monsour, Palestine’s representative to the UN, told the Security Council, “the engineered starvation that has brought an entire civilian population, 2 million people, among them 1 million children, to the edge of famine and then used aid to lure them and confine them to an extremely limited area of the Gaza Strip, clearly to facilitate their expulsion and annexation.”

Last week, Jens Laerke, a spokesperson for the UN’s humanitarian office, told reporters in a briefing that “One hundred percent of the population is at risk of famine,” and that Gaza is the “hungriest place on earth.”

He added that Israel’s ongoing blockade of humanitarian aid into Gaza has made the UN’s efforts to feed the population “one of the most obstructed aid operations, not only in the world today but in recent history.”

On Wednesday, UNICEF spokesperson James Elder said in a statement that he is “shocked” by the extent of malnutrition in Gaza, saying, “I’m seeing teenage boys in tears, showing me their ribs.”

He condemned Israel’s daily massacres of aid-seekers, saying, “Imagine knowing there’d be a massacre, but being so desperate to feed your family that you still go.”

Gaza’s health ministry said Wednesday that 95 Palestinians had been killed in the last 24-hour period and that 440 had been injured. Its official Gaza death toll has risen to 54,607 killed with 125,341 injured since October 7, 2023.