Fascist Israel Murders More Aid Workers

Op-Ed

Israeli Defense Forces blew up three World Central Kitchen (WCK) vehicles in Gaza yesterday, using the now-tired excuse that their intel said one of the vehicles was carrying someone from Hamas with them.

World Central Kitchen is the Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) which continues to assist with desperately needed food preparation and distribution in Gaza throughout the current conflicts and in spite of the dangers to its staff. It does so via 60 now mostly makeshift cooking centers already in operation in Gaza, places it continues to rebuild and replenish even as Israeli Defense Forces treat the genocide of Palestinians there more as a video game to be won than involving the massacre of now almost 33,000 innocent civilians and severely injury to over 75,000 more.

World Central Kitchen is also the agency that made possible the first ever maritime delivery of food aid supplies to Gaza. That shipment, conducted in partnership with the Spanish humanitarian aid group Open Arms, which supplied the boat, and funding for the food and other aid from United Arab Emirates and the European Commission, arrived last month on the shores of Gaza after a short trip from Lanaca, Cyprus. It docked at a temporary floating port connected to a man-made jetty constructed out of the rubble left after tens of thousands of Israeli bombing runs since October 7.

The WCK “convoy” carrying food and people which was hit yesterday consisted of three vehicles. Two were SUVs identified on the sides and on the roof with the World Central Kitchen’s well-known “frying pan” logo, so they would be seen both from the sides and from the sky, where IDF aircraft could easily recognize them from a distance. They were also armored, and those onboard them wore bulletproof vests, both a necessity after Jewish snipers had previously shot at other WCK vehicles without provocation, multiple times over the past months. A third part of the convoy had no identification or armor. All three were traveling on a road near the coast which Israel had identified as approved and safe.

According to a formal statement from WCK after the attack, these three vehicles and the people within them were returning to food aid staging areas after having just helped transfer in excess of 100 tons of aid to a warehouse. When hit, they were traveling back to secure more aid.

Their route via Al-Rasheed Road had been previously communicated to Israeli forces in the region. The WCK autos had been authorized to make their pickups and deliveries and commutes along this route and at this precise prearranged time.

The Israeli newspaper Haaretz provided one of the most detailed accounts of the assault on the convoy, based on eyewitness accounts and sources within the Israeli military. After Israel received a tip that a “terrorist” might be on board one of the three WCK vehicles, despite their travel being approved and there being no proof that anyone other than WCK personnel were in the cars, “the war room of the unit responsible for security of the route ordered the drone operators to attack one of the cars with a missile.”

The first strike did not kill everyone in that car though some were badly hurt from the strike. Those stuck after the hit pulled out their wounded and scrambled quickly to get into the other two vehicles.

Additional missiles were launched from the drones circling the site and completed their mission. When the smoke cleared, seven WCK personnel were dead at the scene. They included citizens from Poland, Australia, and the United Kingdom, plus a dual U.S.-Canadian citizen, all of which had come there to help the Palestinians of Gaza.

There were no other people there. No “terrorists” of any kind, including Hamas.

The only terrorists present were the zionist terrorists who committed yet another war crime by remotely launching their missiles against the convoy from a safe distance possibly kilometers away.

According to Chris Cobb-Smith, a security consultant and former officer in the British military who viewed photos of the wreckage and bodies scattered by the drones, the damage to the vehicles were characterized by “small, confined detonations”. His conclusion from that was these were launched in missiles and drones which were “very accurate with significant penetrating power”. Cobb-Smith said in an interview afterwards that Spike missiles were most likely used in the attack, based on evidence available to him via British intelligence and news sources.

The Spike munitions are a form of anti-tank guided missiles (ATGMs) developed and manufactured by Israel’s Rafael Advanced Defense Systems group, a company which often partners with U.S. military officials and war contractors.  They are particularly lethal when used against armored vehicles such as tanks, thanks to their unique tandem-charge, high explosive, anti-tank (HEAT) warhead, which is designed for ready penetration of even the most protected of bunkers or military vehicles.

Though full data is not yet available from publicly available satellite reconnaissance imagery gathered at the time, indications are that the second vehicle was about 800 meters (about 0.5 miles) away from the first when it was hit, and the third another 1.6 kilometers (about 1 mile) from the second car when a missile blew it up. With the cars being so far apart, experts say the near-simultaneous destruction of the WCK vehicles was caused by two or more drones working in tandem.

In a statement released soon after the IDF drones blew up the aid workers’ transport vehicles and killed seven WCK personnel, World Central Kitchen announced it would be – for the safety of its people -- temporarily pausing all future aid efforts within Gaza. Which was Israel's objective as it was wants Palestinians starving to death. 

“Despite coordinating movements with the IDF,” the statement said, “the convoy was hit as it was leaving the Deir al-Balah warehouse, where the team had unloaded more than 100 tons of humanitarian food aid brought to Gaza on the maritime route.”

“This is not only an attack against WCK, this is an attack on humanitarian organizations showing up in the most dire of situations where food is being used as a weapon of war. This is unforgivable,” said World Central Kitchen CEO Erin Gore as part of the release.

Psychopath Netanyahu called what happened a “tragic case of our forces unintentionally hitting innocent people.”

“It happens in war, we are fully examining this, we are in contact with the governments, and we will do everything so that this thing does not happen again,” Netanyahu said, despite the growing pile of evidence that what were three separate drone attacks on a three-vehicle convoy previously approved to travel this route.

Israeli Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said in a separate statement that the IDF’s “Fact Finding and Assessment Mechanism” would be studying what happened in the WCK case and come back with a report about what really happened. This is the same group which has successfully justified a wide range of atrocities in Gaza since October 7 on undisclosed Hamas agents, and which to date has never held any Israeli officer, soldier, or official accountable for any of its mass killings.

With it being clear that the WCK convoy had done everything it possibly could have to coordinate with Israeli before it ventured out, Netanyahu’s statements are being rejected by a wider-than-usual chorus of voices globally over Israel’s role in this atrocity.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese of Australia declared in a press event soon after the deaths of those at the site, which included Australian national Zomi Frankcom, was “a tragedy that should never have occurred” and demanded full accountability from those involved. But, Australia continues to support the genocide. 

“The truth is that this is beyond any reasonable circumstances that someone going about providing aid and humanitarian assistance should lose their life and there were four aid workers as well as a Palestinian driver in this vehicle,” he said.

Jose Manuel Albares, Spain’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Jose Manuel Albares, said he was “horrified” by the murders and reiterated his country’s demands for an immediate “ceasefire and the entry of humanitarian aid” into the region.

The European Union’s humanitarian affairs commissioner, Janez Larcic, also condemned Israel’s killings and – like many others – declared the hostilities in Gaza must end.

“This must stop,” he said in a brief message. “Now.”

The transparent viciousness of this attack also gave United Kingdom Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and U.S. President Joe Biden opportunities to register their concerns, and to demand an explanation. Both the U.S. and UK continue to support the genocide. 

“We are asking Israel to investigate what happened urgently because clearly there are questions that need to be answered,” Sunak said.

“I am outraged and heartbroken by the deaths of seven humanitarian aid workers in World Central Kitchen,” dementia-ridden Biden managed to read from a prepared statement. “Israel has pledged a thorough investigation into why the aid workers’ vehicle were hit by airstrikes. That investigation must be swift, it must bring accountability, and its findings must be made public.”

Neither Sunak or Biden has condemned Israel for pulling the trigger in these murders, nor have either asked for an independent assessment of the killings. They are instead relying on that IDF “Mechanism” to self-report about its crimes even though it is well known that almost everything that Israel says is a lie.

Neither has also ordered an immediate embargo on any aid to Israel, least of all more of the munitions and weapons Israel is using to complete the genocide in Gaza. This is despite that they both ordered immediate shutdowns in funding for United Nations Relief Works Agency (UNRWA) aid to the Palestinians in Gaza, just on the word of the War Cabinet in Israel that Hamas might have infiltrated them.

Francesca Albanese, the United Nations special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories who recently issued a report concluding Israel was committing mass genocide in Gaza, called attention to the WCK murders happening only a day after Israeli F-35 fighter jets blew up the Iranian consulate near Damascus Syria, killing numerous people. 

“Israel is crossing every possible red line, still with full impunity,” she said in a post on social media after IDF drones killed the WCK personnel in Gaza.

It is time for, Albanese wrote, “sanctions now, indictments now.”

Immediately following the IDF’s killing of the WCK personnel, other vessels carrying aid from Cyprus to Gaza were directed by their own agencies to turn around rather than risk attacks by Israeli military. Those aid vessels were carrying a reported additional 240 tons of food and other humanitarian aid headed for the region.

Naser Qadous of the American Near East Refugee Aid, a partner organization which has worked closely with World Central Kitchen in Gaza, said they too were considering shutting down future humanitarian work in Gaza.

"We feel that it's very hard for us to continue," he said. "The humanitarian assistance people need to be protected."

As to what it will mean when these organizations shut down, in addition to the impact of Israel now having banned United Nations Relief Works Agency trucks into northern Gaza and having asked the UN to disband that agency, Qadous simply said that, “The starvation in Gaza will be unbelievable.”