US confirms plan for private firms to deliver Gaza aid despite UN alarm

[Twiglets1]

The US has confirmed that a new system for providing humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza through private companies is being prepared, as Israel's blockade continues for a third month.

US ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee said "distribution centres" protected by security contractors would provide food and other supplies to over a million people initially, as part of an effort to prevent Hamas stealing aid.

He denied Israel would take part in aid delivery or distribution, but said its forces would secure the centres' perimeters.

It comes as details emerged about the controversial plan, which UN agencies have reiterated they will not co-operate with because it appears to "weaponize" aid.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cp92rlm300mo

They were also given the instructions at 4am, an hour before the centre was due to open. How would that reach thousands of people who had left hours earlier to reach the site. I suppose its just easier for the defenders of the IDF and the new model to say whoopsy they made a mistake.

And I’m highlighting that because there is a big difference in what was initially reported and what in fact happened.
There isn't

Though you will say now that it doesn’t matter if people get randomly shot at an aid distribution centre or if they were shot a kilometer away and only after they walked off the safe designated path & refused to stop walking towards the soldiers even after warning lights had been fired.
People got shot on the controlled route to the aid centre they would not have been there if the aid centre wasn't there. They did not walk off a designated path there was confusion about the route. How do you know they refused to stop walking? How do you know they were ordered to stop walking? I am struggling to understand why you don't seem to get it. They were killed following the route they were told to follow. This isn't the hunger games fgs with the prize for successfully getting to the aid centre a box of food.

Do you believe if Hamas did accept ceasefire agreement and Israel took military control of Gaza, civilians would be safer? I don't.

Because I suspect they don't care - it's victory or martyrdom in their eyes and there has been an uptick in IDF deaths in recent days so they still have the ability to fight and have weapons it would seem. Al Jazeera Arabic posts their slickly produced Hamas propandas videos showing their 'actions' but interestingly not on the Al Jazeera English channel.

The UK has called for an independent investigation into the incidents of IDF shooting civilians who are trying to collect aid. The Middle East Minister also called the new model of aid 'inhumane'

The BBC were reporting that it happened at the Aid Distribution site rather than to people travelling to the site in this article dated May 28th.

The headline being: Dozens injured by Israeli gunfire as crowds overwhelmed Gaza aid site, UN says.

The UN Human Rights Office has said it believes 47 people were injured in Gaza on Tuesday when crowds overwhelmed an aid distribution centre run by a controversial new group backed by the US and Israel.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clyz4mzww1ro

Apologies I believed you were talking about the other aid distribution massacre - there have been so many I get confused about which mass murder site we are discussing. So does it make it more acceptable to murder people 1km from the site? Must be handy for Israel if they know they can massacre civilians as long as it’s outside the entrance - totally not a war crime then!

The IDF handed out leaflets giving contradictory instructions just one hour before the site was due to open. Therefore the civilians who were just looking at the map or didnt even see the instructions at all continued to travel past the roundabout not knowing the IDF would start shooting at them. It's just under a kilometre away from the site. The IDF basically fucked up in more than one way which resulted in many innocent civilians murdered.

You said No news site I saw said it was directly outside the Aid Distribution site - it was always people travelling to the site.

It seemed to be important to you earlier today to clarify where exactly the shootings happened - you denied it when I said early reports said it happened at the aid distribution centre.

Now you imply it doesn't matter where the shootings happened so in future please don't waste my time questioning the details of things I say if the evidence once provided is irrelevant to you anyway.

Actually - what's the point? I really am done discussing this with you.

Actually I think you will find that you are the one who started turning the conversation towards the exact location of the massacre instead of the fact people were murdered. As I said at the end of my reply to you earlier:

Focusing on the exact coordinates of the crime instead of acknowledging that those innocent people were killed is minimising the massacre and is frankly disrespectful to the murder victims and their families.

Aid distribution sites are not ready to re-open this morning but will do so later today (Thursday).The GHF have said they will share information on opening times as soon as the maintenance & repair work is complete.

I'm think we have to be very careful with war reporting from Gaza in general. With no journalists allowed in Gaza the BBC for instance should be following up news reports with caveats saying information may be inaccurate and spending time trying to verify events. This is what we pay our licence fee for.

Unfortunately even with the BBC a creeping bias in this conflict against Israel is starting to become apparent. Jeremy Bowen for instance when commenting on the aid distribution centre deaths immediately started talking about statements about ethnic cleansing conflating a single incidence of death with some unproven strategy of Israel. On Radio 4 there was an interview with an Israeli spokesman to give the Israeli perspective of the conflict and Nick Robinson called him a propagandist (great interviewing).

The BBC needs to maintain its integrity and not become a sister paper to Al Jazeera which is the direction of travel for the Guardian.

I agree @mids2019 it has become clear that we need to be very careful with war reporting from Gaza in general - both sides have been caught lying.

If we have become conscious of this as non journalists, you would think that any media organisation purporting to be fair would know better than to present any story from Gaza in a one sided way.

The Guardian has "integrity" as one of it's core values and the BBC has "trust" claiming to be "independent, impartial and truthful".

The BBC did say that and they also have BBC verify. They also repeatedly make the point that Israel are not allowing journalists into Gaza and so they rely on trusted sources.

it’s funny how this thread has turned into a thread about journalists rather than Palestinians being murdered - which they were.

The thread is about aid delivery, hence the comments on individuals who were shot near the aid delivery site and the reports around who shot them and how different stories or versions are reported by different sources (as always happens). Not sure why your complaining about it, it is linked.

The thread title is about private firms delivering aid in Gaza which is a wider topic than focussing solely on Palestinians being murdered.

Anyway, threads wander into different areas all the time. I started a thread about Trump attacking the BBC yesterday and @Martymcfly24 posted instead about the UN vote last night.

They could have started a separate thread about that seeing as it's a completely different topic but ok.

They are indeed linked.

But even to veer away from the talk of Palestinians being killed is to risk the accusation of not caring about Palestinians being killed & lacking empathy & other personal attacks.

Makes it hard to debate on here which is probably the intention.

Propagandist? But terrorist is a loaded word? So not as 'impartial' as claimed.

Netanyahu has been accused of arming gangs in Gaza that had previously been known to loot aid trucks. When faced with the accusation he doesn't deny it. Why is he arming thieves in Gaza who loot trucks of aid?

https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/ex-defense-chief-liberman-says-netanyahu-arming-gazan-gang-pms-office-does-not-deny/

What sort of fuckery is this?

The Palestinians have been saying for a long time now that armed gangs are looting aid near where the IDF are stationed and they do nothing about it.

Gazan truck drivers are now refusing to drive aid trucks in Gaza because they have been attacked by these armed gangs.

Just when you think the corruption cant get any worse😡

Exactly - their drones are armed with weapons but instead of firing at the armed men shooting (far more threatening than the unarmed civilians they usually shoot) the drone just filmed it.

This is nuts. And if he pays these gangs you get the useful idiots online saying but but Hamas is stealing from their own people.

No. Israel is paying people to steal the minimal amount of aid he allows in the country for optics. He gets to blame Hamas when the IDF start shootings civilians. Absolutely insane.

Exactly this. Israel has been backing criminal gangs in Gaza and that they are the one's stealing the aid and stealing it at greatly inflated prices.

"An interesting statistic raised by security sources is the number of looting incidents in the Gaza Strip that the IDF has identified since the humanitarian aid began about a week ago. This is 110 looting incidents, and according to the IDF, none of them were carried out by Hamas terrorists, but by three different groups: Gazan civilians, armed gangs, and organized clans"

https://www.mako.co.il/news-military/f239747af17c5910/Article-e8c913bafce0791026.htm?pId=173113802