‘It’s a Killing Field’: IDF Soldiers Ordered to Shoot Deliberately at Unarmed Gazans Waiting for Humanitarian Aid
Posted by flatulentbaboon
‘It’s a Killing Field’: IDF Soldiers Ordered to Shoot Deliberately at Unarmed Gazans Waiting for Humanitarian Aid
Posted by flatulentbaboon
5 Comments
>The distribution centers typically open for just one hour each morning. According to officers and soldiers who served in their areas, the IDF fires at people who arrive before opening hours to prevent them from approaching, or again after the centers close, to disperse them. Since some of the shooting incidents occurred at night – ahead of the opening – it’s possible that some civilians couldn’t see the boundaries of the designated area.
>”It’s a killing field,” one soldier said. “Where I was stationed, between one and five people were killed every day. They’re treated like a hostile force – no crowd-control measures, no tear gas – just live fire with everything imaginable: heavy machine guns, grenade launchers, mortars. Then, once the center opens, the shooting stops, and they know they can approach. Our form of communication is gunfire.”
>The soldier added, “We open fire early in the morning if someone tries to get in line from a few hundred meters away, and sometimes we just charge at them from close range. But there’s no danger to the forces.” According to him, “I’m not aware of a single instance of return fire. There’s no enemy, no weapons.” He also said the activity in his area of service is referred to as Operation Salted Fish – the name of the Israeli version of the children’s game “Red light, green light”.
>In one incident, the soldier was instructed to fire a shell toward a crowd gathered near the coastline. “Technically, it’s supposed to be warning fire – either to push people back or stop them from advancing,” he said. “But lately, firing shells has just become standard practice. Every time we fire, there are casualties and deaths, and when someone asks why a shell is necessary, there’s never a good answer. Sometimes, merely asking the question annoys the commanders.”
>In that case, some people began to flee after the shell was fired, and according to the soldier, other forces subsequently opened fire on them. “If it’s meant to be a warning shot, and we see them running back to Gaza, why shoot at them?” he asked. “Sometimes we’re told they’re still hiding, and we need to fire in their direction because they haven’t left. But it’s obvious they can’t leave if the moment they get up and run, we open fire.”
This is absolutely sickening and horrific. Not much else I can say.
> Another senior officer familiar with the fighting in Gaza said the normalization of killing civilians has often encouraged firing at them near the aid distribution centers. “The fact that live fire is directed at a civilian population – whether with artillery, tanks, snipers, or drones – goes against everything the army is supposed to stand for,” he said, criticizing the decisions made on the ground. **”Why are people collecting food being killed just because they stepped out of line, or because some commander doesn’t like that they’re cutting in? Why have we reached a point where a teenager is willing to risk his life just to pull a sack of rice off a truck? And that’s who we’re firing artillery at?”**
Surprise surprise, Yehuda Vach is implicated again. Same general who ordered the [slaughter of paramedics last month.](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/apr/12/idf-unit-killing-palestinian-paramedics-golani-brigade)
> A senior officer whose name repeatedly comes up in testimonies about the shootings near aid sites is Brigadier General Yehuda Vach, commander of the IDF’s Division 252. Vach decided to disperse gatherings of Palestinians waiting for UN aid trucks by opening fire. “This is Vach’s policy,” the officer said, “but many of the commanders and soldiers accepted it without question. [The Palestinians] are not supposed to be there, so the idea is to make sure they clear out, even if they’re just there for food.”
!ping MIDDLE-EAST
I’m glad someone posted this article. I wanted to post a related effort-post weeks ago, but it was never approved. I’ll just take the opportunity to post it now. Note that this is about the incident that took place on June 01: [Debunking Misinformation from Both Sides on Gazans Killed En Route to Aid Site](https://medium.com/@Splemndid/debunking-misinformation-from-both-sides-on-gazans-killed-en-route-to-aid-site-e657628a846d). If there’s anything I got wrong, lemme know.
The post is pretty lengthy, but I like to be comprehensive as there are a lot of details to cover. This was the original TL;DR that covers the main points:
## TL;DR
* On Sunday, June 1, a [mass casualty incident](https://apnews.com/article/gaza-humanitarian-foundation-aid-israel-hamas-d9e205966fb08bdbba0a842e1762a322) took place near the Al-Alam roundabout in Rafah, approximately 1 km away from an aid site that Gazans were traveling to.
* In the aftermath of this incident, two diametrically opposed narratives quickly emerged: one that accused the IDF of engaging in a merciless slaughter of Gazans desperate for aid, and one that absolved the IDF of any responsibility.
* The reality is likely to be somewhere in the middle. [Analyses such as those conducted by CNN](https://edition.cnn.com/2025/06/04/middleeast/israel-military-gaza-aid-shooting-intl-invs) support the hypothesis that this was an abysmal attempt at crowd control instead of pure malice.
* The evidence provided by the IDF and other organizations are either deeply flawed, or don’t address the core claims being made in the reporting.
* For example, [CCTV footage](https://xcancel.com/ItayBlumental/status/1929172903163027561) from the aid site does not show the location or the time the incident took place. Similarly, the [IDF’s drone footage](https://xcancel.com/idfonline/status/1929220806699061307) does not show a mass casualty event, and nor is it anywhere close to [the time or location](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-06-04/news-verify-gaza-aid-deaths-timeline/105372210) the actual event took place.
* BBC Verify fact-checked a video posted by an Al Jazeera journalist claiming to show a video of the incident. This led to [false claims](https://xcancel.com/EYakoby/status/1929636364175527959) on Twitter that the BBC had retracted their story, and that they had used this video in their reporting. Notably, the video still showed the aftermath of an Israeli strike gone awry, as the [IDF themselves admitted to.](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cr7zplv35l1o)
* While there are a plethora of pro-Israel narratives I endorse or operations I will defend (e.g., the pager operation against Hezbollah), I believe this to be an instance where the IDF are not being entirely forthcoming about the relevant details here.
* Ultimately, the I-P news cycle moves on, and I don’t anticipate any further clarity from the IDF on this incident.
I’ve focused quite heavily on this incident because it was the first mass casualty event relating to the new aid distribution mechanisms in some capacity, and thus we received a quite a few analyses on the matter trying to uncover what happened. A day after I published my post, the Wall Street Journal posted their analysis which largely aligned with what I wrote in my piece: [How U.S. and Israel-Backed Aid Delivery in Gaza Turned Deadly](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZ2jMnEAUgM).
Since the incident on June 01, there have been a plethora of more incidents involving Gazans being shot en route to the GHF’s sites. Compared to the June 01 incident, it’s difficult to ascertain what exactly transpired in the weeks after. Once these incidents (regardless of the perpetrators or the nature in which it occurred) become routine, and if it occurs amidst a hectic news cycle (in this case, the Israel-US-Iran conflict), there is less of an incentive for the IDF to respond.
The assessment I made for the June 01 incident was that this was likely an absolutely abysmal attempt at crowd control, and the Haaretz piece adds some important details.
—
## Did the IDF lie about the June 01 incident?
There were two pieces of material the IDF disseminated in the aftermath of the June 01 incident: [drone footage](https://xcancel.com/idfonline/status/1929220806699061307) on the same day of the incident showing armed men shooting civilians; and several days later, [an audio recording](https://xcancel.com/IDF/status/1930627570002805101) between a COGAT officer and a Gazan resident who claimed that the people who fired on the day were Hamas, and the IDF was merely responding to this.
Both of these have sections dedicated to them in [my post](https://medium.com/@Splemndid/debunking-misinformation-from-both-sides-on-gazans-killed-en-route-to-aid-site-e657628a846d) if you want more detail. To summarize, the release of the drone footage without *any context* was ***highly disingenuous*** as it led folk to believe that this was the incident that all the reporting was about. But it wasn’t, it was a completely unrelated incident at a different time and location; it was nowhere near an aid distribution site; and nor does it show a mass casualty incident — **and if the IDF had that footage, they would have immediately released it.**
For the audio recording, let me be clear on some facts:
For the June 01 incident, the IDF has never said Hamas was involved. Remember, this was a mass casualty event: if Hamas shot these civilians, or if the IDF was engaged in a ***firefight*** with Hamas and civilians were caught in the crossfire, **some IDF soldier on the ground would have mentioned this.**
Instead, we [were first told](https://xcancel.com/IDF/status/1929205105242394756) that they “did not fire at civilians while they were near or within the aid site”, and then it was communicated to news outlets by some officials that [“warning shots”](https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/idf-denies-firing-on-gazans-at-or-near-aid-distribution-site-says-warning-shots-were-1km-away/) were fired.
Rather than choosing to respond to [CNN’s analysis](https://edition.cnn.com/2025/06/04/middleeast/israel-military-gaza-aid-shooting-intl-invs), their final word on this incident was the audio recording. This random Gazan tells us that the IDF was involved in a firefight with Hamas, and that’s what the June 01 incident was about. Just… pause and reflect on how bizarre this is: why are we being told for the first time about a firefight engagement the IDF had from this Gazan man *rather than the IDF themselves?* Why didn’t this show up in the initial inquiry, or any other subsequent investigation? Why would you allow this random Gazan to describe the nature of the firefight? Nothing about this made any sense whatsoever.
What I presumed happened here is that the IDF did not anticipate that these incidents would become routine, and they wanted to win the information war on the June 01 incident. They were content with releasing this recording in an attempt to muddy the waters just enough to keep them out of hot water.
The Haaretz article states:
> The soldier added, “We open fire early in the morning if someone tries to get in line from a few hundred meters away, and sometimes we just charge at them from close range. But there’s no danger to the forces.” According to him, “I’m not aware of a single instance of return fire. There’s no enemy, no weapons.” He also said the activity in his area of service is referred to as Operation Salted Fish – the name of the Israeli version of the children’s game “Red light, green light”.
Does that mean there was literally never an incident of return fire? Of course not, this is simply his own account, and across the myriad incidents that have happened over the past few weeks, it is still plausible that Hamas attempted to instigate.
I do not think this was the case for the June 01 incident, however. Considering this was the first mass casualty event, and it generated the most amount of media attention and analyses, the IDF were pressured and incentivized to examine it more thoroughly. If there were accounts by soldiers on the ground claiming they were fired upon by Hamas, the IDF would not hesitate to relay this information. I don’t know who precisely made the decision to release that audio recording, but I’m hard-pressed to see it as anything other than an attempt to deceive.
That drone footage has also led to *so many misinterpretations* on what transpired on June 01. You can see that play out in this analysis by the Free Press: [Inside the IDF “Aid Massacre” That Never Happened](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-zfQBfpqlw). Again, for a more exhaustive breakdown on this, [my post](https://medium.com/@Splemndid/debunking-misinformation-from-both-sides-on-gazans-killed-en-route-to-aid-site-e657628a846d) has a section dedicated to this. [OSINTdefender tweeted:](https://archive.li/jaIRR)
> Drone footage captured earlier today by the Israel Defense Force showing unknown masked-gunmen, likely Hamas, opening fire on several Palestinians attempting to retrieve humanitarian supplies from an aid center near Khan Yunis in Southern Gaza.
But this is utterly wrong, the footage does not show an aid center. In fact, it’s [*8 km away from the actual aid distribution site in Rafah.*](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-06-04/news-verify-gaza-aid-deaths-timeline/105372210) But in the title of the [IDF’s YouTube video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnJK0j6beao), it states:
> Hamas Caught Shooting Civilians at Aid Distribution Site in Gaza
Completely false. The aid distributions sites are those run by the GHF. Once again, I’m hard-pressed to see the dissemination of this drone footage as anything other than an attempt to deceive.
“Most moral army in the world”