One person was killed and one was injured in an attack on Saturday on a convoy of Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) staff members and their families who had been attempting to evacuate from northern Gaza.
The person who was killed was a relative of an MSF staff member. “MSF condemns in the strongest terms this deliberate attack.”
“The convoy was made up of 137 people — Palestinian MSF staff members and their families including 65 children. Since November 11 they have been trapped in MSF’s guesthouse office and outpatient clinic near Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza because of ongoing fighting and we have repeatedly called for their safe evacuation” MSF said in a statement on Saturday.
MSF explained that on Saturday morning its convoy of five vehicles departed at 9:00 a.m. local time all clearly marked with MSF identification including on the roofs.
MSF said it arranged for the movement of the convoy but when the convoy reached the point where the Israeli army had constructed a newly erected checkpoint the area was already overcrowded with Palestinian civilians seeking to flee.
However after hours of waiting the Israeli army did not allow the convoy to cross toward the south and shots were fired to push it back to Gaza City MSF added.
When the convoy was on its way back it was attacked. “Two of the MSF cars were deliberately hit killing one MSF staff’s family member and injuring another.”
MSF has called again to urgently allow the evacuation of its staff and their families as well as of thousands of other people who are trapped by fighting and living in extremely dire conditions in northern Gaza.
“We are calling for an immediate ceasefire which is the only way for corridors to be implemented to safely evacuate trapped civilians.”
