Witnesses describe how people were shot as Israeli soldiers fired into the crowds surrounding the aid convoy

They went out in their thousands, camping overnight along the coastal road in the cold Gaza night – building small fires to keep warm – huddled together waiting for supplies to arrive so they could feed their families.

What they encountered were dead and wounded as Israeli forces opened fire on hungry, desperate Palestinians who rushed forward as aid trucks finally arrived after dark on Thursday, according to three eyewitnesses and a doctor who treated the wounded.

“I saw things I never thought I would see,” said Mohammed Al-Sholi, who had camped overnight for a chance to get food for his family. “I saw people fall to the ground after being shot and others just grab whatever food they had with them and keep running for their lives.”

More than 100 Palestinians were killed on Thursday morning, health officials in Gaza said, when Israeli forces opened fire as huge crowds crowded around aid trucks.

An Israeli military spokesman, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, acknowledged that Israeli forces opened fire “when a mob moved in a way that endangered them,” without giving details. But he denied that soldiers shot at people trying to get food. “Despite the accusations, we did not shoot those who sought help,” he said. Most of the deaths were caused by stampedes, Admiral Hagari said, and some people were hit by emergency trucks.

The truck convoy was long and it remained unclear what exactly happened at the various locations. But Mr. Al-Sholi and two other witnesses said in telephone interviews that they saw Israeli forces shooting directly at people as they tried to reach the convoy. A doctor at a nearby hospital described seeing dozens of people with gunshot wounds.

Huge groups of people have camped for aid or rushed to convoys in recent weeks, hoping for some relief from the severe hunger that has gripped northern Gaza during nearly five months of an Israeli offensive that has seen intense bombing, siege and a ground invasion. .

Mr Al-Sholi, a 34-year-old taxi driver, said he was forced to join the thousands of people who gathered at the Nabulsi Roundabout in Gaza City because he and his family, including three young children , can survive on little other than the spices, chopped wheat and wild vegetables they can find.

On Wednesday he had heard that people had received bags of flour from relief trucks and there were rumors that another convoy was coming. So, around 7pm on Thursday, he went to Nabulsi roundabout with friends to wait.

He said he had never seen so many people gathered in one place. Others described tens of thousands of people waiting.

“Just before the trucks arrived, a tank started moving towards us. It was around 4:30 in the morning and fired a few shots in the air,” Mr. Al-Sholi said in a telephone interview. ‘That tank fired at least one shell. It was dark and I ran back to a destroyed building and took refuge there.”

When emergency trucks arrived shortly afterward, people ran toward them in desperation and gunfire started, the witnesses said.

“As usual, when the relief trucks arrived, people ran to get food and drinks and whatever else they could get,” said Mohammad Hamoudeh, a photographer in Gaza City. But when the people reached the trucks, he said, “the tanks started shooting directly at the people.”

He added: “I saw them firing direct machine gun fire.”

Mr Hamoudeh said despite the fear and panic on the ground, many were still rushing for supplies. “People were terrified, but not everyone. There were people who risked death just to get food,” he said. “They just want to live.”

The witnesses said the tanks fired grenades at people even after they started running away. They said tanks arrived between 3 and 4 a.m. and began firing regularly at Gaza residents, stopping around 7 a.m.

The Israeli military did not respond to questions about whether Israeli tanks opened fire before or after the aid trucks arrived. Admiral Hagari said the trucks reached Gaza City around 4:45 am

Partial drone video footage released by the Israeli military, along with social media videos of the scene analyzed by The New York Times, do not fully explain the sequence of events. Videos show panic, including people running for cover and grabbing food from trucks.

Mr Al-Sholi described the chaos as he drove away from the emergency trucks and people around him were hit.

“I saw people falling to the ground,” Mr Al-Sholi said. “The man next to me was shot in the arm and immediately lost his finger.”

As he fled, he said, he saw about 30 people on the ground, killed or wounded. One of the dead was his cousin, who was shot while running with a bag of flour, he said. About 150 yards from one of the tanks, he remembered seeing a boy about 12 years old lying on the ground with his face covered in blood. Some people were also run over by the emergency trucks, he said.

A third witness, a journalist who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals from the Israeli army, said the Israeli fire was so intense that it was difficult to reach the wounded.

The tanks did not stop firing until around 07:00, but did not withdraw. People began dragging or carrying the dead and wounded while reciting the Islamic declaration of faith, fearing the tanks would start firing again, Mr. Hamoudeh said.

Ambulances had gathered about a mile away, but could not get closer for fear of being shot at by Israeli forces. Some people carried or carried the wounded on donkey carts, or took them to hospitals on their own

About 150 injured and 12 of the dead arrived at Kamal Adwan Hospital, said Dr. Eid Sabbah, the head of nursing there. He said about 95 percent of the injuries were gunshot wounds to the chest and abdomen.

Many of the wounded were in critical condition and required surgery, but the hospital, like the few others still operating in Gaza, suffered from a lack of electricity, fuel, medical equipment and medicine.

Medical staff could only perform 20 operations, with painkillers but no anesthesia, in their three equipped operating rooms, Dr. Sabbah said. Like the food supply, medical aid has become scarce over the past four months, leaving the few hospitals still in operation struggling to treat patients beyond emergency care.

Dr. Sabbah warned that many of those injured in Thursday’s shooting could not be properly treated at their hospitals.

“There are patients in the ICU who require specializations, medications and complex operations,” he said. “Their only hope is to be transferred outside Gaza for treatment.”

Approach Ibrahim reporting contributed.