Two American aid workers were injured on Saturday in a terrorist attack during food distribution efforts at a Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) site in Khan Yunis, the organization said.
According to preliminary information, two assailants threw grenades at the aid workers as food distribution concluded. Thousands of Gazans had safely received food before the attack. No local aid workers or civilians were harmed. The injured Americans are receiving medical treatment and are in stable condition.
The IDF said that on Saturday morning, it received an update from the GHF stating that terrorists had thrown two grenades into an aid distribution site in Rafah at the end of the aid distribution, while civilians were still present at the site.
As a result of the explosion of one of the grenades, two American site personnel were injured, it said, noting that IDF troops had facilitated the safe evacuation of the injured for further medical treatment.
“The terrorist organizations in the Gaza Strip continue efforts to sabotage the distribution of humanitarian aid at the designated aid sites intended for the civilian population. In doing so, they are cynically and deliberately harming civilians in the Gaza Strip,” the IDF said.
GHF said in a statement, “We are grateful their injuries are not life-threatening and ask the public to keep them and their families in their thoughts and prayers.
“GHF has repeatedly warned of credible threats from Hamas, including explicit plans to target American personnel, Palestinian aid workers and the civilians who rely on our sites for food. Today’s attack tragically affirms those warnings,” the statement continued.
The foundation emphasized its continued commitment to delivering humanitarian aid. “Attempts to disrupt this life-saving work will only deepen the crisis,” the organization said. “We will continue to stand with the people of Gaza and do everything in our power to deliver the aid they so urgently need.”
In a separate statement, GHF interim Executive Director John Acree said on Saturday, “Even amid violence and chaos, our team delivered over 1.8 million meals today. That is the story of GHF: a system that works, a team that endures, and a mission that will not be shaken. We will continue feeding the people of Gaza, safely, directly and at scale.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a statement on Sunday night urged the international community to condemn the attack.
The Israeli prime minister sent his “best wishes for a speedy recovery to the employees of the American aid foundation, who were wounded in the terrorist incident that was perpetrated by Hamas terrorists at the food distribution facility,” according to a statement from his office.
The foundation was doing “important work,” said Netanyahu, who thanked both it and U.S. President Donald Trump.
“The entire world needs to stand up and condemn the severe incident, which again reveals the brutality of Hamas,” he added.
The U.S. State Department on June 26 announced a $30 million grant to GHF, with the potential for further investment, and has repeatedly vouched for its effectiveness in delivering aid as an alternative to the United Nations, which Washington says has allowed Hamas to control and loot aid.
A senior State Department official said on July 1 that the U.N has an “institutional interest” in lying about the foundation, which is seen as a competitor to the “monopolistic” hold over aid.
The U.S. official also noted that none of the reports about massacres by the Israeli military against aid-seeking civilians near foundation sites have been verified or corroborated by video, despite the omnipresence of smartphones in Gaza.
GHF Chairman Johnnie Moore on Monday criticized the U.N. for failing to condemn the Hamas attack last month that killed a dozen of his staff members.
“Hamas itself actually attacked some of our volunteer Gazan aid workers, killed 12 of them, injured others of them, piled their bodies in front of Nasser Hospital in Gaza, refusing to allow them any medical treatment at all,” said Moore.
“And the United Nations, which receives billions of dollars from the United States government and the Europeans, didn’t even … issue a statement condemning Hamas’s murder of these local Gazan aid workers,” he added.
While the GHF thought it was merely “poking the bear of a designated terrorist organization that wants to steal the aid from people,” Moore said his NGO quickly discovered “the underbelly of the United Nations and all of these organizations around the world.”
Jerusalem has welcomed the arrival of GHF as a means of delivering aid directly to Palestinians, preventing Hamas terrorists from stealing the majority of the supplies.