LEILA FADEL, HOST:
We're going to talk more about that Doctors Without Borders statement that says the system set up by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation should be taken apart. The group calls it, quote, "a slaughter masquerading as humanitarian aid." Aitor Zabalgogeazkoa is one of the group's emergency coordinators. He says what used to be 400 aid sites run by independent aid groups has been cut down to four, run by GHF. As we heard, that's an entity backed by the U.S. and a plan backed by Israel. On a scratchy line from southern Gaza, he described what these four distribution sites look like.
AITOR ZABALGOGEAZKOA: They look like football fields, you know, surrounded by mounds. So the people is being forced through a street, which is already an area considered a combat zone by the Israeli forces. They're forced through that, and then in a moment, they open the doors. They allow anybody who is able to, who is quicker than others, to grab whatever they can and they and they force the people out in less than, you know, half an hour, something like that. What happens is when the people is approaching the - how is the - distribution sites, and they are not going through the correct, you know, street that is designated, they get shot. When they are inside and they are overloading, so the mounds or the barbed wire or they are too close to the IDF forces, they get shot. And if they stay longer or they arrive later to the distribution, they get shot too.
FADEL: And they're being shot by the Israeli military?
ZABALGOGEAZKOA: They have been shot by the Israeli military and by whoever is managing those distribution points.
FADEL: Now, the Israeli government is denying that the military is purposely shooting at civilians. So if you could say exactly how you know this is happening, and if these denials ring true to you.
ZABALGOGEAZKOA: It's very simple to deny that. They could allow international journalists in, which is not the case. And we know that because we have very close by primary health care center who had been completely overloaded day after day after day after day with wounded people and dead people coming from the place and everybody telling the same history. Everybody is saying, we went there, we went for the food. This is a lot of people, everybody fighting for the food, everybody fighting for the boxes and then, you know, getting shot at any moment. So that's what - why we know.
FADEL: And I'll just underscore that the entirety of this war, international journalists have not been allowed inside. NPR has a producer inside, but we've had no international journalists go in. So if Palestinians in Gaza do manage to survive the crowds - I mean, I've seen pictures of thousands upon thousands of people trying to get through - what kind of food do they take away? What aid do they get?
ZABALGOGEAZKOA: They get a box of 20 kilos with basic commodities - how is - pasta, rice, oil, etc. But consider that they need to walk for kilometers. So normally only the youngest of the families or the younger peoples they are able to go there.
FADEL: So this 44-pound box, if they're lucky enough to get it, and if they survive the crowds. What discussions is Doctors Without Borders having with the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, the Israeli government, the Israeli military, the U.S., about your demand that these sites be dismantled and not be controlled by a warring party?
ZABALGOGEAZKOA: Well, no, we have not been able to talk to them directly, but we are asking publicly to stop, you know, these so-called aid mechanisms because it's an abomination.
FADEL: You called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation and these four sites that distribute food and aid an abomination. Can you say why?
ZABALGOGEAZKOA: Why? It's very clear - because humanitarian aid is designed to save the lives of people and not to kill people, and the carnages that they are happening once again and again and again in such places cannot be, and they are not humanitarian aid. They are a political scheme and a military scheme, and I doubt that they are trying to win the - how is the - the minds and the hearts of the Palestinians. So this carnage needs to stop. And of course, an immediate ceasefire is needed in Gaza, and adequate aid should be let in.
FADEL: Aitor Zabalgogeazkoa, a Doctors Without Borders emergency coordinator in Gaza. Thank you for speaking with us.
ZABALGOGEAZKOA: Thank you to you for keeping Gaza in your reports. Thank you very much.
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