End Gaza barbarity, says Pope, as 85 die in aid queues

Pope Leo XIV has condemned the "barbarity" of the war in Gaza and the "indiscriminate use of force" as Gaza's health ministry said at least 85 Palestinians had been killed queueing for food yesterday.

- Jennifer Rankin

The ministry said yesterday that the victims had been killed in different locations, mostly in northern Gaza. It said 79 of the dead had been killed by Israeli fire while waiting for UN aid trucks entering through the northern Zikim crossing with Israel.

The UN World Food Programme said that shortly after entering Gaza, a WFP convoy of 25 trucks carrying food aid had encountered "massive crowds of hungry civilians" who then came under gunfire. "WFP reiterates that any violence involving civilians seeking humanitarian aid is completely unacceptable," it said.

The director of al-Shifa hospital, Mohammed Abu Salmiya, told the Associated Press that since yesterday morning the hospital had received 48 people who were killed and 150 who were wounded while seeking aid from lorries expected to enter Gaza at the Zikim crossing.

He could not say whether the dead had been killed by the Israeli army, armed gangs or both.

Israel's military said soldiers had shot at a gathering of thousands of Palestinians in northern Gaza who it claimed posed a threat, and it was aware of some casualties. But it said the numbers reported by officials in Gaza were far higher than its initial investigation had found. It did not immediately comment on the incident in the south.