Soon after the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) began distributing aid to war-torn Gaza in May, disturbing reports emerged of Israeli soldiers killing unarmed Palestinians approaching aid points for food. As the world's eyes turned from Gaza to Israel attack on Iran, the pace of these reported killings increased -- with multiple incidents claiming more than 50 lives each. Now, Israel's oldest daily newspaper has dropped a bombshell report, with Israeli soldiers and officers confirming the routine use of deadly force on unarmed Palestinians as a barbaric form of crowd control -- with the practice carried out under orders from superior officers. 

Gaza's Hamas-run health authority says 529 Palestinians have been killed at humanitarian aid sites or while waiting for food trucks just since late May, when the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) took on the task of distributing food in the strip. While Israel's defenders invariably discredit Gaza casualty counts, US Army Colonel Nathan McCormack, who previously headed up the Joint Chiefs' Levant and Egypt branch, has said, "We (Department of Defense, Department of State and the U.S. Intelligence Community) consider the Gaza Health Ministry figures to be generally reliable." A shadowy organization, GHF is led by an evangelical Christian leader with close ties to Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Trump. 

Employing a rhetorical device frequently used when Israel is accused of lethal wrongdoing, Netanyahu dismissed the newspaper's report as a "blood libel" against the IDF 

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) called the soldiers' and officers' accounts "vicious lies designed to discredit...the most moral army in the world."

However, perhaps bowing to the sheer breadth of the report by Haaretz, the IDF says it's investigating the allegations.  

According to the enlisted soldiers and officers who spoke to Haaretz, a variety of deadly weapons have been routinely used as a means of communicating whether Palestinians have permission to approach the aid stations. 

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. -- Haaretz