Updates: Israeli forces kill dozens at US-backed aid sites in Gaza

The Freedom Flotilla Coalition says one of its vessels has left Sicily to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza, after a previous attempt failed because of a drone attack. For more, read this story.

To learn how Israel killed more than 30 Palestinians at two aid distribution sites and injured 200 others, read this story.

And you can follow all our coverage of Israel’s war on Gaza here.

We’ll be closing this live page soon. Here’s a recap of the day’s major developments:

• Israel continued its relentless bombardment of the Gaza Strip, killing at least 54 people, while maintaining a strict blockade as a famine looms.
• Israeli tanks and drones opened fire on Palestinians gathered at aid distribution sites run by a Israel-and-US-backed group, killing more than 30 people as they searched desperately for food.
• Israeli forces completely destroyed the Noura al-Kaabi Dialysis Hospital, the only facility for dialysis patients in northern Gaza, which served more than 160 people after having been renovated and reopened just weeks ago.
• The United Nations said more than 632,000 Palestinians have been displaced since Israel broke the nearly two-month-old ceasefire with Hamas in Gaza on March 18.
• Mediators Qatar and Egypt announced renewed efforts to secure a ceasefire deal based on a US-backed proposal for a 60-day truce and the entry of humanitarian aid.
• Yemen’s Houthi rebels claimed responsibility for a ballistic missile attack on Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv, Israel. The missile was intercepted, authorities said.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has denounced the killing of dozens of hungry Palestinians who gathered at Israel-run distribution sites in Gaza.

“These ‘aid’ concentration sites – in which a handful of desperate people are given starvation rations as a cruel publicity stunt designed to deflect attention from Israel’s forced starvation campaign – are in reality ‘killing zones’ for that state’s machine of death and destruction,” CAIR said in a statement.

“This is pure evil operating with impunity and with the world’s silence. The genocide must stop and the Palestinian people must be recognized as human beings deserving freedom and justice on their own land.”

Medical charity Doctors Without Borders (MSF) says survivors it treated at a Gaza aid site run by a new US-backed organisation reported being “shot from all sides” by Israeli forces.

It blamed the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation‘s aid distribution system for chaos at the scene in the southern Gaza town of Rafah.

“Patients told MSF they were shot from all sides by drones, helicopters, boats, tanks and Israeli soldiers on the ground,” MSF said in a statement.

Communications officer Nour Alsaqa reported hospital corridors filled with patients, mostly men, with “visible gunshot wounds in their limbs”.

MSF quoted one wounded man, Mansour Sami Abdi, as describing people fighting over just five pallets of aid. “They told us to take food – then they fired from every direction,” he said.

Italian President Sergio Mattarella says the “refusal to apply the rules of humanitarian law to the citizens of Gaza is unacceptable”.

“That an entire population, from children to the elderly, should be starved is inhuman,” Mattarella said ahead of celebrations marking Italy’s national day, Italian media reported.

“It is essential that the Israeli army makes the territories of the [Gaza] Strip accessible to the action of international bodies, making it possible to resume full humanitarian assistance to the people,” he said.

Saudi Arabia has accused Israel of “extremism and rejection of peace” after it blocked a planned visit by Arab foreign ministers to the occupied West Bank.

Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud made the remarks during a joint news conference in Jordan’s capital, Amman, on Sunday with his counterparts from Jordan, Egypt, and Bahrain.

“Israel’s refusal of the committee’s visit to the West Bank embodies and confirms its extremism and refusal of any serious attempts for [a] peaceful pathway … It strengthens our will to double our diplomatic efforts within the international community to face this arrogance,” Prince Faisal said.

Read the full story here.

Gaza resident Mo’men al-Fayomi has described the ongoing destruction of tall buildings still standing in Gaza City after 19 months of Israeli army bombardment.

About 70 buildings that are five storeys or higher have been blown up in the past two days in relentless Israeli strikes.

“What happened was all of a sudden, we saw people running. We asked, ‘What’s going on?’ People said, ‘it’s an evacuation for the building behind us’. We ran about 50 metres [164 feet]. The building was bombed and caused severe damage, and we could not take any of our belongings. There are no Hamas or other fighters in the area, just business owners and stores,” al-Fayomi told Al Jazeera.

Palestinians say this number of buildings completely flattened in the past 48 hours is an indication of Israel’s strategy to push them out of the north permanently.

Multiple witnesses say Israeli troops fired on crowds near aid sites run by the new Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF). Before Sunday, 17 people were killed while trying to reach them, according to Zaher al-Waheidi, head of the Gaza Health Ministry’s records department.

The GHF says private security contractors guarding its sites have not fired on crowds. Israel’s military has acknowledged firing warning shots on previous occasions.

United Nations agencies and major aid groups have refused to work with the new GHF system, saying it violates humanitarian principles.

On Sunday, thousands of people headed towards the distribution site hours before dawn. As they approached, Israeli forces ordered them to disperse and come back later, witnesses said. When the crowds reached the Flag Roundabout, 1km (0.6 mile) away, at around 3am, Israeli forces opened fire, the witnesses said.

“There was fire from all directions, from naval warships, from tanks and drones,” said Amr Abu Teiba, who was in the crowd.

The director of Gaza’s Ministry of Health, Muneer al-Boursh, has posted images of the Noura al-Kaabi Dialysis Hospital, which was struck multiple times by the Israeli military.

Al-Boursh said the centre, the only one of its kind in northern Gaza, was serving more than 160 patients after having been renovated and reopened weeks ago.

بعد أن تم ترميمه وإعادة افتتاحه قبل أسابيع لخدمة مرضى الغسيل الكلوي، حيث إنه المركز الوحيد لغسيل الكلى في مدينة غزة ومحافظة الشمال، والذي كان يخدم أكثر من 160 مريضًا بالفشل الكلوي في شمال القطاع، ورغم أنه كان يعمل وسط صعوبات نقص الوقود واللوازم الطبية، قام الاحتلال الإسرائيلي… pic.twitter.com/Aa1m3zxhC4

— Dr.Muneer Alboursh د.منيرالبرش (@Dr_Muneer1) June 1, 2025

Translation: The Israeli occupation has destroyed the Nour al-Kaabi Dialysis Centre at the Indonesian Hospital after it was renovated and reopened just weeks ago to serve 160 dialysis patients in Gaza City and the northern governorate, despite operating under severe shortages of fuel and medical supplies. 

The Israeli military has said in a statement that it “eliminated” a Hezbollah operative with the group’s artillery unit in the area of Aita al-Shaab, in southern Lebanon.

Earlier, Lebanon’s Ministry of Health said Israeli attacks had killed at least two people.

Israel and Hezbollah signed a ceasefire deal in November, but Israel has continued to strike Lebanon, claiming the group is attempting to regroup after two months of all-out war.

The Palestinian group has issued a statement praising the earlier declaration by Qatar and Egypt saying they are intensifying efforts to reach a ceasefire based on a proposal put forward by the US envoy to the Middle East.

“We are ready to immediately begin a round of indirect negotiations to reach an agreement leading to a permanent ceasefire and a full withdrawal of the occupation,” Hamas said.

“Qatar and Egypt, in coordination with the United States of America, affirm their intention to intensify efforts to overcome the obstacles facing the negotiations,” the two mediators said in a joint statement.

“The two countries are also striving to swiftly reach a 60-day temporary truce, which would pave the way for a permanent ceasefire agreement in the Gaza Strip.”

Israeli forces have assaulted a young Palestinian man at a military checkpoint near the entrance to Jericho in the occupied West Bank, injuring him, the news agency Wafa reports.

The man, identified as Izz al-Din Khaled Abu Rabee from Fawwar refugee camp south of Hebron, was reportedly subjected to a beating before being transferred to al-Ahli Hospital in Hebron for treatment.

Israel launched a military campaign in the West Bank in January. The UN agency for Palestinian refugees, or UNRWA, has called the assault “by far the longest and most destructive operation in the occupied West Bank since the second intifada in the 2000s”.

The Israeli army has raided the town of Araba, south of Jenin, Al Jazeera correspondents report.

An infantry unit entered the town from the Dotan military checkpoint and ransacked a house as drones hovered in the air.

Israeli forces have intensified their assaults on towns and villages in the Jenin governorate since the start of the offensive on Jenin city and its refugee camp on January 21.

The Israeli army has released drone footage that it says shows armed men opening fire on Palestinians trying to obtain food from an aid distribution centre.

It accused Hamas of trying to prevent the people of Gaza from reaching the aid, which is coordinated by the Israeli army and US security contractors. It wasn’t possible to independently verify the video.

Gaza’s Government Media Office earlier accused Israel of using fake footage to cover up its “massacre”.

A Palestinian woman whose brother-in-law was killed while waiting for aid near Rafah has described what the killing by Israeli soldiers means to her family.

“He went to get food for his children. His children were dying of hunger. He said, ‘I want to go.’ He left his three children behind and died. Three little children. One of them is still breastfeeding. He’s nine months old,” Elham al-Qudra said.

Dr Bassam Zaqout from the Palestinian Medical Relief Society explained what happens at the Israel-backed aid sites.

“All the distribution points are surrounded by Israeli troops, and when they see a crowd that is not controlled, they usually shoot toward the people waiting for aid,” he said.

Gaza’s Government Media Office has accused the Israeli army of releasing a fabricated drone video to try to deflect responsibility for an incident in southern Gaza’s Rafah that killed 31 Palestinians and injured 200 near an aid distribution point run by a US-backed group.

The office dismissed the Israeli claim “gunmen” opened fire on a crowd seeking aid, calling it a “blatant lie” that contradicts witness accounts and field evidence. Survivors reported direct Israeli gunfire on unarmed civilians with no fighting observed in the area.

The statement also pointed out the video footage was taken in eastern Khan Younis, not western Rafah, where the massacre occurred. It added the video shows flour bags being distributed – something not provided at the aid site – further undermining its credibility.

The media office said Israel has repeatedly used such manipulated media to justify deadly attacks, including strikes on UN-run schools, while systematically blocking aid, targeting relief convoys and enabling armed gangs that loot humanitarian supplies.

“The truth is clear. Israeli soldiers opened fire on starving crowds. No video can erase that crime,” the media office said.

Rafah, the site of deadly attacks on aid seekers in southern Gaza, has been emptied of its civilian population with the Israeli military continuously destroying what’s left of any infrastructure there, a humanitarian worker says.

Ahmed Bayram from the Norwegian Refugee Council told Al Jazeera that Israel’s chosen aid distributor has asked starving people to come back “under the bullets and the bombs” as the needs of hungry Palestinians reach “unprecedented levels”.

“What’s happening can be seen as a pretext to displace more people from the north. Let’s be clear – it’s nothing new. It’s just a new tactic in the grand scheme of Israeli aims. Forcible displacement is very much an aim as part of this operation,” Bayram said.