Gaza’s Government Media Office (GMO) on Friday confirmed reports regarding narcotic pills of the type "Oxycodone" being found in flour bags distributed as aid to starving Palestinians by the US-backed and Israeli military-operated Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).
Expressing its "deep concern and condemnation" over the discovery of narcotic pills inside flour bags, the Media Office further raised fears regarding the possibility of such substances being ground into the flour, which the Palestinians have consumed.
"We have so far documented four testimonies from citizens who found these pills inside flour bags. More serious is the possibility that some of these narcotic substances were deliberately ground or dissolved in the flour itself, which raises the scope of the crime and transforms it into a serious attack directly targeting public health," said the statement published by the Media Office on Telegram.
“We hold the Israeli occupation fully responsible for this heinous crime of spreading addiction and destroying the Palestinian social fabric from within, as part of a systematic policy that constitutes an extension of the genocide it is waging against our Palestinian people,” it added.
"The Israeli occupation’s use of drugs as a soft weapon in a dirty war against civilians, and its exploitation of the blockade to smuggle these substances as ‘aid and assistance’, constitute a war crime and a grave violation of international humanitarian law," the statement said.
Meanwhile, at least 62 Palestinians were killed by Israel on Friday including at least 10 who were shot dead while waiting to receive aid at the distribution sites of the GHF in southern Gaza.
The GHF started operations in May this year, after Israel announced it would partially lift a three-month-long blockade of humanitarian assistance and allow limited aid inside the war-ravaged territory, where the UN has flagged a famine-like situation.
Rights groups and the UN have refused to cooperate with the GHF, slamming it as a "death trap" for Palestinians and accusing it of aiding Israel in its genocidal war on Gaza.
According to Gaza's health ministry, Israel has killed more than 549 Palestinians at aid distribution sites since the GHF began operations last month.
The UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, called the GHF an "abomination" that has put Palestinians' lives at risk, while a spokesman for the UN human rights office, Thameen Al-Kheetan, condemned the "weaponisation of food" in the territory.
'A killing field': IDF soldiers ordered to shoot at civilians at aid sites
Israeli newspaper Haaretz has reported that Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) soldiers were given "orders" to shoot at unarmed Palestinians seeking aid at the distribution points of the notorious GHF.
According to the report, citing unnamed Israeli soldiers, the troops were given official orders to shoot at unarmed Palestinian civilians who appeared to pose no threat.
“We fired machineguns from tanks and threw grenades... There was one incident where a group of civilians was hit while advancing under the cover of fog,” one soldier was quoted by Haaretz as saying.
Another soldier told the newspaper that where he was stationed in Gaza, between "one and five people were killed every day.”
“It’s a killing field,” the soldier said.
Responding to the "shocking confessions," Gaza's Government Media Office reiterated that "war crimes" are taking place in the enclave.
"The report’s direct military orders to fire on unarmed civilians who pose no threat, and the use of heavy machine guns, artillery, and shells against peaceful gatherings waiting for food, are further evidence that the Israeli occupation army is pursuing a systematic policy of genocide under the false guise of ‘relief’," the Media Office said in a statement.
Meanwhile, the Israeli army "strongly rejected" the accusations in the report and said the allegations will be investigated.
“Any allegation of a deviation from the law or [military] directives will be thoroughly examined, and further action will be taken as necessary. The allegations of deliberate fire toward civilians presented in the article are not recognized in the field,” the military said in a statement.
However, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Israel Katz condemned the report as a “blood libel” on the IDF.
"The IDF operates under difficult conditions against a terrorist enemy that operates from within the civilian population... IDF soldiers receive clear orders to avoid harming innocent civilians, and they act accordingly,” they said in a statement carried by The Times of Israel.
Multiple reports including from UN agencies, have found Israel to have deliberately targeted civilians in its genocidal war on Gaza.
Israel has so far killed at least 56,331 Palestinians in Gaza, with more than half being women and children. Israel has also targeted and killed hundreds of journalists, health care workers and aid workers. Israel has also targeted hospitals, refugee camps, schools and residential complexes, causing mass casualties of civilians, mostly children.
