AID STORM AS ATTACKS KEEP ON...

New group 'is weaponising assistance'

- BY CHRIS HUGHES Defence and Security Editor

AT least 81 Palestinians were killed by Israeli attacks in Gaza within a 24-hour period.

The mounting death toll came as a controversial Israel and US-backed aid group began distributing supplies in the south of the Strip.

The Gaza Humanitarian Founda-tion has been slammed by other aid groups who say it is politicised.

Former United Nations Relief Agency spokesman Chris Gunness blasted the scheme as “aid washing”.

He added: "It's quite simply the use of humanitarian aid to justify the weaponisation of humanitarian assistance, but also to justify ethnic cleansing and genocide."

With famine looming in war-ravaged Gaza, Israeli tank and gunfire was reported yesterday as crowds of Palestinians tried to reach a newly opened GHF aid distribution centre.