Palestine

Rally is held as British PM Keir Starmer calls Israel’s actions ‘intolerable’, addressing lawmakers in Parliament.

Pro-Palestine campaigners have rallied against Israel’s punishing war on Gaza, gathering outside the British Parliament in London and demanding a full arms embargo and that hard-hitting sanctions be imposed on the Israeli government.

Wednesday’s march, organised by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC), came as British Prime Minister Keir Starmer took weekly questions from parliamentarians.

Thousands of protesters created a “Red Line for Palestine”, wearing red while encircling the building.

Starmer told Parliament that Israel’s actions in the besieged and bombarded enclave are “appalling” and “intolerable”.

“It is right to describe these days as dark,” Starmer said. “We have strongly opposed the expansion of Israeli military operations, and settler violence, and the blocking of humanitarian aid.”

Starmer added that the UK has imposed sanctions, suspended free trade negotiations, and is currently considering further sanctions.

But the UK leader, his Foreign Secretary David Lammy, and his government have come under heavy criticism in the UK for not speaking more forcefully backed by actual action earlier in the war, and for not doing enough now as Palestinians face what United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has called the “cruellest phase of this cruel conflict”.

Al Jazeera’s Rory Challands, reporting from London, said the protest went on for several hours and throughout Starmer’s entire speech to Parliament.

“There was a red line around the whole of Parliament,” Challands said.

“These protesters had formed a cordon, essentially all the way down from Parliament to the first bridge … that goes across to the other side of the [River] Thames, and they came back up … and returned over Westminster Bridge to join up here to make a full loop,” he added.

According to Challands, protesters say that their “red line” is to show that the UK government should have its own red lines when it comes to Gaza.

It has not had “sufficient” red lines in place, he said. “The protesters say there should have been red lines before 54,000 deaths.”

In his remarks, Starmer also called for an end to the siege and said humanitarian aid must reach Gaza quickly and in the required quantities.

Israel has maintained a crippling blockade on the territory, barring the entry of much-needed aid, including food, medicine, clean water, and fuel required by generators. A famine now looms as more than two million people are facing starvation, the UN has warned.

Meanwhile, a controversial, United States-backed group that runs aid distribution points in Gaza – the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) – has suspended operations for a full day. The move came after Israeli forces opened fire at hungry aid seekers several times, killing dozens of Palestinians and injuring hundreds more since the organisation started operating in the enclave on May 27.

The killing of people desperately seeking food supplies has triggered mounting international outrage as many say aid is being weaponised and with the UN’s Guterres demanding an independent inquiry.

Israel’s war on Gaza has killed at least 54,607 Palestinians and wounded 125,341, according to the Health Ministry.

There was confusion and panic on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla on Tuesday night after a drone was spotted circling overhead, prompting the crew to issue a distress signal while sailing outside Greek territorial waters. The drone was later identified as belonging to the Hellenic Coastguard. The Gaza-bound mission continues undeterred, a month after another flotilla ship was bombed by a drone and set ablaze.

Khan Younis, Gaza – Yazan Musleh, 13, lies in a hospital bed set up in a tent on the grounds of Nasser Hospital, his t-shirt pulled up to reveal a large white bandage on his thin torso.

Beside him, his father, Ihab, sits fretfully, still shaken by the bloodied dawn he and his sons lived through on Sunday when Israeli forces opened fire on thousands of people gathered to receive aid from the Israeli-conceived, and United States-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).

Ihab, 40, had taken Yazan and his 15-year-old brother, Yazid, from their shelter in al-Mawasi, Khan Younis, to the Rafah distribution point that the GHF operates.

They set out before dawn, walking for about an hour and a half to get to the al-Alam Roundabout roundabout in Rafah, near the distribution point.

Worried about the size of the gathering, hungry crowd, Ihab told his sons to wait for him on an elevation near the GHF gates.

“When I looked behind the hill, I saw several tanks not far away,” he says. “A feeling of dread came over me. What if they opened fire or something happened? I prayed for God’s protection.”

As the crowd moved closer to the gates, heavy gunfire erupted from all directions.

“I was terrified. I immediately looked towards my sons on the hill, and saw Yazan get shot and collapse,” he recalls.

Yazid, also sitting by his brother’s bedside, describes the moments of terror.

“We were standing on the hill as our father told us, and suddenly, the tanks opened fire.” He says. “My brother was hit in the stomach immediately.”

“I saw his intestines spilling out – it was horrifying. Then people helped rush him to the hospital in a donkey cart.”

Down by the gates, Ihab was struggling to reach his sons, trying to fight against the crowd while avoiding the shots still ringing out.

“Shooting was coming from every direction – from tanks, quadcopters.

“I saw people helping my son, eventually dragging him away.”

When Ihab managed to get away from the crowd, he ran as best as his malnourished body could manage, towards Nasser Hospital, in hopes that Yazan had been taken there. It felt like more than an hour, he says.

At Nasser Hospital, he learned that Yazan had been taken into surgery.

“I finally breathed. I thanked God he was still alive. I had completely lost hope,” he says.

The bullet that hit Yazan had torn through his intestines and spleen, and the doctors say he needs long and intensive treatment.

Sitting by him is his mother, Iman, who asks despairingly why anyone would shoot at people trying to get food. She and Ihab have five children, the youngest is a seven-month-old girl.

“I went to get food for my children. Hunger is killing us,” says Ihab.

“These aid distributions are known to be degrading and humiliating – but we’re desperate. I’m desperate because my children are starving, and even then, we are shot at?”

He had tried to get aid once before, he says, but both times he came away empty-handed.

“The first time, there was a deadly stampede. We barely escaped. This time, my son was wounded and again… nothing,” he says.

But he knows he cannot stop trying.

“I’ll risk it for my family. Either I come back alive or I die. I’m desperate. Hunger is killing us.”

The group distributing aid

The GHF, marketed as a neutral humanitarian mechanism, was launched in early 2025 and uses private US military contractors to “secure the distribution points”.

The GHF’s head, Jake Wood, resigned his post two days before distribution began, citing concerns that the foundation would not be impartial or act in accordance with humanitarian principles.

Five days later, on May 30, the Boston Consulting Group, which had been part of the planning and implementation of the foundation, withdrew its team and terminated its association with GHF.

International aid organisations have been unanimous in criticising the GHF and its methods.

‘We went looking for food for our hungry children’

Lying nearby in the tent ward is Mohammed al-Homs, 40, a father of five.

He had also headed out early on Sunday to try to get some food for his family, but moments after arriving at the al-Alam Roundabout roundabout, “I was shot twice – once in the leg and once in the mouth, shattering my front teeth,” he says.

“I collapsed, there were so many injured and dead around me. Everyone was screaming and running. Gunfire was coming from tanks, drones everywhere. It felt like the end of the world.”

He lay bleeding on the ground for what felt like an hour, as medical teams were not able to reach the injured.

Then, word spread that the gates had opened for distribution, and those who could move started heading towards the centre.

It was only then that people could start moving the wounded to a nearby medical point.

“This was my first time trying to get aid, and it will be my last,” Mohammed says.

“I didn’t expect to survive. We went looking for food for our hungry children and were met with drones and tanks.”

‘I never imagined I’d face death for a box of food’

Also in the tent is someone who had succeeded in getting an aid package on the first day of distribution, on May 27, and decided to try again on Sunday: 36-year-old Khaled al-Lahham.

Al-Lahham is taking care of 10 family members: his parents, one aunt, and seven siblings, all of whom are displaced in the tents of al-Mawasi.

He had managed to catch a ride with five friends that morning, driving as close as they could to the al-Alam Roundabout roundabout.

As the distribution time approached, the six friends started getting out of the car.

“Suddenly, there was loud gunfire all around and people screaming. I felt a sharp pain in my leg – a bullet had passed clean through my thigh,” says Khaled, who did not make it fully out of the car.

“I was screaming and bleeding while people around me ran and screamed. The shooting was frenzied,” he adds. “There were tanks, quadcopters – fire came from every direction.”

Injured, Khaled could not get out of the car and huddled there until one of his friends managed to return and drive him to the hospital.

“I never imagined I’d face death for a box of food,” Khaled says.

“If they don’t want to distribute the aid, why do they lie to people and kill them like this?

“This is all deliberate. Humiliate us, degrade us, then kill us – for food?”

“The bread was dipped in blood.” A Palestinian child mourns his mother who was killed when Israeli forces opened fire at an aid distribution point in Rafah, Gaza. More than 100 people have been killed in days of attacks at aid hubs run by the US-Israeli backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.

Israeli forces have killed at least 27 Palestinians and injured 90 more as they opened fire close to an aid distribution site in Rafah, according to the Ministry of Health in Gaza.

The latest killings came early on Tuesday at the Flag Roundabout, near an aid hub operated by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).

It was the third such incident around the Rafah hub in as many days. Gaza’s authorities report that more than 100 aid seekers have been killed since the United States- and Israel-backed GHF started operating in the enclave on May 27, with reports of violence, looting and chaos rife.

The Israeli military said it had fired shots as “a number of suspects” deviated from the regulated routes, on which a crowd was making its way to the GHF distribution complex.

The “suspects” were about 500 metres (approximately 550 yards) from the site, the military said in a statement on Telegram, adding that it was looking into reports of casualties.

The death toll was confirmed by Zaher al-Waheidi, head of the Gaza Health Ministry’s records department.

A spokesperson for the International Committee of the Red Cross, Hisham Mhanna, said 184 wounded people had been taken to its field hospital in Rafah, 19 of whom were found dead on arrival, and eight others died later of their wounds.

Video verified by Al Jazeera’s Sanad fact-checking agency showed the arrival of dozens of injured people at the hospital.

Lured

Gaza’s Government Media Office accused Israel of “a horrific, intentionally repeated crime”, saying it has been luring starving Palestinians to the GHF centres – controversially opened following an 11-week total blockade to take over most aid distribution from the United Nations and other aid agencies – and then opening fire.

It said Tuesday’s death toll brought the number of aid seekers killed at aid sites in the Rafah governorate and the so-called Netzarim Corridor since GHF launched operations to 102, with 490 others injured.

The United Nations on Monday demanded an independent investigation into the repeated mass shootings of aid seekers in Gaza.

“It is unacceptable that Palestinians are risking their lives for food,” said Secretary General Antonio Guterres. “I call for an immediate and independent investigation into these events and for perpetrators to be held accountable.”

“We heard from witnesses that there was chaos,” said Al Jazeera’s Hind Khoudary, reporting about Tuesday’s killings from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza. “The Israeli forces just opened fire randomly, shooting Palestinians … using quadcopters and live ammunition.”

Health Ministry officials and doctors said most of the wounded have been hit in their chest and head, she added.

The bloodshed, she continued, had unfolded in the same way as on the previous two days, amid ongoing chaos around the aid distribution centres.

“There’s no process. There’s no system,” she said. “You just need to run first to be able to get the food.”

‘Either way, we will die’

Rasha al-Nahal told The Associated Press news agency that “there was gunfire from all directions”, and that she saw more than a dozen people dead and several wounded on the road.

When she finally made it to the distribution hub, there was no aid, al-Nahal said, adding that Israeli troops “fired at us as we were returning”.

Another witness, Neima al-Aaraj, from Khan Younis, described the shooting as “indiscriminate”.

“I won’t return,” she said. “Either way, we will die.”

The Israeli military, in its statement on Telegram, said troops had fired warning shots as people deviated from “designated access routes” and “after the suspects failed to retreat, additional shots were directed near a few individual suspects who advanced toward the troops”.

However, it denied firing on civilians or blocking them from accessing aid.

This account echoes statements around similar incidents on Sunday, when 31 aid seekers were reportedly killed, and on Monday, when three more were killed.

Shati refugee camp, Gaza – Inside a stifling tent in Shati, one of Gaza’s overcrowded displacement camps, 30-year-old Raneem Abu Al-Eish cares for her sisters, Aseel, 51, and Afaf, 33.

They sit close to Raneem, laughing at times and at others growing agitated when the cries of children playing outside get too loud.

Aseel and Afaf suffer from celiac disease and intellectual disabilities that impair their speech, understanding, and behaviour – conditions that have only deepened under the strain of war and displacement.

They struggle to express themselves, often overwhelmed by their environment, Raneem explains. While she doesn’t know the medical term for their condition, the symptoms at times mirror Tourette syndrome.

‘People laugh, it devastates them’

The cramped tent shelters seven family members: Raneem, her two sisters, their elderly parents, and another sister with her husband.

Raneem’s mother is frail, and her father is still recovering from an injury sustained in Israel’s relentless war on Gaza, leaving Raneem to shoulder their care alone.

The family used to live in Jabalia camp’s Block 2, until Israel destroyed their home eight months ago. Since then, they have moved from relatives’ homes to makeshift shelters, then to an overcrowded United Nations school.

Now they are in this tent, which traps sweltering heat by midday and lets the bitter cold seep through its thin walls in the night.

Privacy and dignity are nearly impossible in the crowded tent. “When they need to change, we try to get the others to step out,” Raneem says. “But it’s not always possible.”

Yet that is only part of the ordeal for Aseel and Afaf, who are bullied daily due to their conditions.

“People don’t understand what my sisters go through,” Raneem says softly. “They judge by appearances, assuming they’re fine. But they aren’t. They need care, patience, dignity.”

Life in the camp overwhelms Aseel. “She finds it hard to cope with noise or sudden changes,” Raneem explains. “When that happens, she gets distressed – she shouts, cries, sometimes lashes out.”

Afaf, meanwhile, struggles with involuntary movements and impulsive behaviours. “A small argument or loud voice can trigger her,” Raneem adds.

“She doesn’t know how to control it,” she says, which makes it all the more sad that Afaf is frequently targeted for mockery, especially by children.

Using communal bathrooms brings repeated humiliation. “Every bathroom visit becomes a spectacle. People laugh, make cruel remarks, and it devastates them,” Raneem says.

Israel took their protector

The family’s greatest blow came six months ago, when Mohammad, Raneem’s 22-year-old brother, was taken by Israel.

Mohammad had gone to Kamal Adwan Hospital for surgery after a hand injury. While he was there, Israel raided the hospital on October 25 and seized Mohammad. Since then, the family knows nothing about his whereabouts.

Mohammad was the sibling most adept at navigating the outside world. “He got their medicines, managed hospital visits, dealt with aid agencies,” Raneem explains. “Without him, we’re completely alone.”

Since his detention, the sisters face worsening food shortages and a lack of medical care. “He was their protector,” Raneem says, her voice breaking. “Now we have no one.”

Between March and May, intensified bombing again displaced 436,000 Palestinians, many for the second, third or fourth time since the October 2023 beginning of the war. For families like Raneem’s – already in tents or shelters – each new wave of violence means starting over again, often without food or medicine.

For Aseel and Afaf, even basic nutrition is rife with threats. Celiac sufferers cannot eat gluten, which damages their small intestines.

In a starving Gaza where there is little to eat other than wheat-flour bread, which contains gluten, there is little chance that Raneem can find vegetables or meat for the sisters, especially with Mohammad detained.

Without gluten-free flour, Aseel and Afaf risk severe malnutrition, and they have gotten a dismally small amount of the 80 tonnes of gluten-free flour that aid agencies have thus far delivered to Gaza.

Much of it was blocked by closed borders, damaged roads, and broken distribution systems. “The little that reaches us is too expensive or too late,” Raneem says.

Begging for empathy, again and again

Before the war, Aseel and Afaf had routine medical care at Kamal Adwan Hospital.

Their conditions required special diets, medication, and regular therapy, needs now nearly impossible to meet.

Psychological specialist Dr Sara al-Wahidi says the war has sharply worsened the marginalisation of people with disabilities in Gaza.

“We’ve seen people with disabilities become separated from [their families in] displacement areas – some missing for long periods, sadly later found deceased,” she explains.

A 2025 report estimates that at least 15 percent of Gaza’s displaced population lives with a disability, and they have to navigate the makeshift shelters, whether in encampments, schools, or hospitals, that lack functioning ramps, adapted toilets and basic accessibility.

Raneem also battles social stigma, and despite her efforts – talking with neighbours, seeking support from community elders – ignorance persists.

“People provoke them, mock them. All we ask is understanding,” she says.

Some elders occasionally invite the sisters to their tents for a visit, brief moments of respite in a daily reality where they have no consistent medical or social support.

“We’ve been displaced again and again, from Jabalia to the west, then Gaza City,” Raneem recounts. “Every new place, we have to start over, explaining their condition, begging for patience.

“These aren’t just war victims,” she pleads.

“They’re vulnerable people forgotten by the world.”

Israeli forces have opened fire again on Palestinians seeking humanitarian aid from a distribution site in Gaza, killing at least three people and injuring more than 30, as the United Nations demands an independent investigation into the repeated mass shootings of aid seekers in the strip.

The shooting erupted at sunrise on Monday at the same Israeli-backed aid point in southern Gaza where soldiers had opened fire just a day earlier, according to health officials and witnesses.

“The Israeli military opened fire on civilians trying to get their hands on any kind of food aid without any kind of warning,” Al Jazeera’s Tareq Abu Azzoum reported from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza.

“This is a pattern that’s been widely condemned by international aid organisations because it enhances the breakdown of civil order without ensuring humanitarian relief can be received by those desperately in need.”

Witnesses said Israeli snipers and quadcopter drones routinely monitor aid sites run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which is backed by Israel and the United States.

A Red Cross field hospital received about 50 people wounded in the latest shooting, including two who were dead on arrival, said Hisham Mhanna, a spokesperson for the International Committee of the Red Cross. Most had been hit by bullets or shrapnel. A third body was taken to Nasser Hospital in nearby Khan Younis.

Moataz al-Feirani, 21, said he was shot in the leg while walking with thousands of others towards the food site.

“We had nothing, and they [the Israeli military] were watching us,” he told The Associated Press news agency, adding that surveillance drones circled overhead. The shooting began about 5:30am (02:30 GMT)  near the Flag Roundabout, he said.

The pattern of deadly violence around the GHF aid distribution site has triggered mounting international outrage, and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Monday demanded an independent inquiry into the mass shooting of Palestinians.

“It is unacceptable that Palestinians are risking their lives for food,” he said. “I call for an immediate and independent investigation into these events and for perpetrators to be held accountable.”

The Israeli military has denied targeting civilians, claiming its soldiers fired “warning shots” at individuals who “posed a threat”.

The GHF has also denied the shootings occurred although doubts about its neutrality have intensified since its founding executive director, former US marine Jake Wood, resigned before operations even began after he questioned the group’s “impartiality” and “independence”.

Critics said the group functions as a cover for Israel’s broader campaign to depopulate northern Gaza as it concentrates aid in the south while bypassing established international agencies.

Aid is still barely trickling into Gaza after Israel partially lifted a total siege that for more than two months cut off food, water, fuel and medicine to more than two million people.

Thousands of children are at risk of dying from hunger-related causes, the UN has previously warned.

At least 51 people killed in 24 hours

Elsewhere in the territory, Israeli air attacks continued to hammer residential areas.

In Jabalia in northern Gaza, Israeli forces killed 14 people, including seven children, in an attack on a home, according to the Palestinian Civil Defence agency. At least 20 people remained trapped under the rubble.

Two more Palestinians were killed and several wounded in another attack in Deir el-Balah, according to the Palestinian news agency Wafa, while a drone attack in Khan Younis claimed yet another life.

Gaza’s Ministry of Health reported that at least 51 Palestinians have been killed and 503 injured in Israeli attacks across the territory in the latest 24-hour reporting period alone.

Despite growing international condemnation, Israel’s military on Monday ordered the displacement of even more civilians from parts of Khan Younis, warning it would “operate with great force”.

Roughly 80 percent of the strip is now either under Israeli military control or designated for forced evacuation, according to new data from the Financial Times, as Gaza’s 2.3 million residents are crammed into an ever-shrinking patch of land in southern Gaza near the Egyptian border.

Israel has made little secret of its aim to permanently displace Gaza’s population as officials openly promote “voluntary migration” plans.

The Financial Times reported that the areas Palestinians are being pushed into resemble a “desert wasteland with no running water, electricity or even hospitals”.

Satellite images showed Israeli forces clearing land and setting up military infrastructure in evacuated areas.

Analysts who reviewed dozens of recent forced evacuation orders said the trend has accelerated since the collapse of a truce in March.

“The Israeli government has been very clear with regards to what their plan is about in Gaza,” political analyst Xavier Abu Eid told Al Jazeera.

“It is about ethnic cleansing.”

Critics, including US officials, are calling for the Freedom Flotilla Coalition’s new mission to fail, with twelve volunteers, including Swedish activist Greta Thunberg on board. The flotilla is trying to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza.

Israel says its settlement expansion is to “prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state” as it announced 22 new settlements in the occupied West Bank. Palestinian lawyer Diana Buttu says Israeli officials are daring the world to stop them.

Multiple people were injured after a man shouting “free Palestine” tossed Molotov cocktails at a gathering in support of Israeli hostages in Colorado, authorities said.

Police said eight people were injured in the attack at the Pearl Street Mall, a popular outdoor space in Boulder, about 30 miles (48km) from Denver.

The FBI called it a suspected terror attack and said the suspect used a makeshift flamethrower, Molotov cocktails and other incendiary devices.

Footage of the attack shows the suspect, who was shirtless, screaming at the group and had what appears to be Molotov cocktails in each hand when he was arrested.

The attack unfolded during a weekly scheduled demonstration put on by Run for Their Lives, a pro-Israeli group that that holds walks in the outdoor pedestrian mall in solidarity with Israeli hostages in Gaza.

Police got calls around 13:26 local time (20:26 BST) about a man with a weapon and people being set on fire, Boulder Police Chief Stephen Redfearn said at a news conference.

Witnesses told authorities that the suspect used a “makeshift flamethrower and threw an incendiary device into the crowd, ” said Mark Michalek, who heads the FBI’s Denver office.

Redfearn added those devices included Molotov cocktails being tossed at the crowd.

He identified the suspect as Mohamed Sabry Soliman, 45.

Soliman is an Egyptian national, government officials told the BBC’s US partner CBS News.

In 2022, Soliman arrived in California on a non-immigrant visa that expired in February 2023, multiple sources have told CBS News. He had been living in Colorado Springs.

Officers who responded found multiple people injured, including those with burns.

Footage that appeared to be from the attack showed a chaotic scene: smoke filling the air, people running in multiple directions, spots of grass on fire and people injured on the ground.

Warning: This story contains details some readers may find distressing.

In images and videos posted online, but not yet verified by the BBC, a man appearing to be the suspect is seen without a shirt and holding bottles with liquid with a piece of red cloth inside. He can be heard yelling at the crowd and appears to be advancing on them as some rush to flee.

As he screams, one woman is on the ground and appears injured. People surround her and one man pours water on her body.

Footage shows police rushing to the scene and arresting the suspect. Police say he was taken to the hospital with injuries.

“It is clear that this is a targeted act of violence and the FBI is investigating this as an act of terrorism,” Mr Michalek said. “Sadly, attacks like this are becoming too common across the country.”

The attack is the second high-profile act of violence in the US in the last two weeks related to the conflict in Gaza.

A man who shouted “free Palestine” fatally shot two Israeli embassy employees outside a Jewish museum in Washington DC on 22 May. The incident happened at a networking event organised by a Jewish organisation.

Colorado’s Attorney General Phil Weiser said that from what officials know the attack “appears to be hate crime given the group that was targeted”.

“People may have differing views about world events and the Israeli-Hamas conflict, but violence is never the answer to settling differences,” Weiser said in a statement on Sunday. “Hate has no place in Colorado.”

Israel’s foreign minister, Gideon Sa’ar, said he was “shocked” by the incident and called the attack “pure antisemitism”.

“Shocked by the terrible antisemitic terror attack targeting Jews in Boulder, Colorado,” he wrote on X. “This is pure antisemitism, fueled by the blood libels spread in the media.”

Danny Danon, Israel’s ambassador to the UN, similarly was saddened over the attack, calling it “terrorism” and asking for “concrete action” in response.

In a post on X, the ambassador said that Jewish protesters were brutally attacked”.

“Terrorism against Jews does not stop at the Gaza border – it is already burning the streets of America,” he said.

The 12-person crew, which includes climate activist Greta Thunberg, expects to take seven days to reach Gaza.

International nonprofit organisation Freedom Flotilla Coalition (FFC) says one of its vessels has left Sicily to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza, after a previous attempt failed due to a drone attack on a different ship in the Mediterranean.

The 12-person crew, which includes Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg, Irish actor Liam Cunningham and Franco-Palestinian MEP Rima Hassan, set sail on the Madleen from the port of Catania on Sunday, carrying barrels of relief supplies that the group called “limited amounts, though symbolic”.

The voyage comes after another vessel operated by the group, the Conscience, was hit by two drones just outside Maltese territorial waters in early May. While FFC said Israel was to blame for the incident, it has not responded to requests for comment.

“We are doing this because no matter what odds we are against, we have to keep trying, because the moment we stop trying is when we lose our humanity,” Thunberg told reporters at a news conference before the departure. The Swedish climate activist had been due to board the Conscience.

She added that “no matter how dangerous this mission is, it is nowhere near as dangerous as the silence of the entire world in the face of the lives being genocised”.

🇵🇸 ⛵️ Avec @GretaThunberg nous appelons à la mobilisation citoyenne pour soutenir massivement le navire humanitaire de @GazaFFlotilla ! C’est le seul moyen de garantir notre sécurité. 🙏 pic.twitter.com/5DUJbkRdPZ

— Rima Hassan (@RimaHas) June 1, 2025

The activists expect to take seven days to reach their destination, if they are not stopped.

The FCC, launched in 2010, is a non-violent international movement supporting Palestinians, combining humanitarian aid with political protest against the blockade on Gaza.

It said the trip “is not charity. This is a non-violent, direct action to challenge Israel’s illegal siege and escalating war crimes”.

United Nations agencies and major aid groups say Israeli restrictions, the breakdown of law and order, and widespread looting make it extremely difficult to deliver aid to Gaza’s roughly two million inhabitants.

The situation in Gaza is at its worst since the war between Israel and Hamas began 19 months ago, the UN said on Friday, despite a resumption of limited aid deliveries in the Palestinian enclave.

Under growing global pressure, Israel ended an 11-week blockade on Gaza on May 19, allowing extremely limited UN-led operations to resume.

On Monday, a new avenue for aid distribution was also launched: the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, backed by the United States and Israel, but with the UN and international aid groups refusing to work with it, saying it is not neutral and has a distribution model that forces the displacement of Palestinians.

The FCC is the latest among a growing number of critics to accuse Israel of genocidal acts in its war in Gaza, allegations Israel vehemently denies.

“We are breaking the siege of Gaza by sea, but that’s part of a broader strategy of mobilisations that will also attempt to break the siege by land,” said activist Thiago Avila.

Avila also mentioned the upcoming Global March to Gaza – an international initiative also open to doctors, lawyers and members of the media – which is set to leave Egypt and reach the Rafah crossing in mid-June to stage a protest there, calling on Israel to stop the Gaza offensive and reopen the border.

Foreign ministers from Egypt, Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE had planned the visit to discuss Palestinian statehood and end to war on Gaza.

Saudi Arabia has accused Israel of “extremism and rejection of peace” after it blocked a planned visit by Arab foreign ministers to the occupied West Bank.

Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud made the remarks during a joint news conference in Jordan’s capital, Amman, on Sunday with his counterparts from Jordan, Egypt, and Bahrain.

“Israel’s refusal of the committee’s visit to the West Bank embodies and confirms its extremism and refusal of any serious attempts for [a] peaceful pathway … It strengthens our will to double our diplomatic efforts within the international community to face this arrogance,” Prince Faisal said.

His comments followed Israel’s decision to block the Arab delegation from reaching Ramallah, where they were set to meet Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. The ministers from Egypt, Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) had planned the visit as part of efforts to support Palestinian diplomacy amid Israel’s ongoing war on Gaza.

Israel controls the airspace and borders of the West Bank, and on Friday announced it would not grant permission for the visit.

“The Palestinian Authority – which to this day refuses to condemn the October 7 massacre – intended to host in Ramallah a provocative meeting of foreign ministers from Arab countries to discuss the promotion of the establishment of a Palestinian state,” an Israeli official had said, adding that Israel will “not cooperate” with the visit.

Prince Faisal’s trip to the West Bank would have marked the first such visit by a top Saudi official in recent memory.

Jordan’s Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said blocking the trip was another example of how Israel was “killing any chance of a just and comprehensive” Arab-Israeli settlement.

An international conference, co-chaired by France and Saudi Arabia, is due to be held in New York from June 17 to 20 to discuss the issue of Palestinian statehood.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty said the conference would cover security arrangements after a ceasefire in Gaza and reconstruction plans to ensure Palestinians would remain on their land and foil any Israeli plans to evict them.

Israel has come under increasing pressure from the United Nations and European countries, which favour a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, under which an independent Palestinian state would exist alongside Israel.

Palestinian group Hamas claims a recent ceasefire proposal passed to them by United States special envoy Steve Witkoff is different from one they had agreed to a week earlier.

Basem Naim, a leading Hamas official, told Al Jazeera on Saturday that the group “responded positively” to the latest proposal relayed by Witkoff, even though it offered “no guarantees to end the war”, according to Naim.

Israel has killed more than 54,000 Palestinians since October 2023, and its total aid blockade since March has caused starvation and a famine-like situation in Gaza, home to 2.3 million people, most of whom were displaced by 19 months of relentless bombardment.

Amid international pressure, Israel has allowed a trickle of aid into Gaza, which has been described as a “drop in an ocean” by humanitarian groups.

Here’s what you need to know about the ceasefire proposal.

Did Hamas reject the ceasefire proposal?

According to the group, no.

It says it responded positively but added a few key provisions.

What are the key points in Hamas’s proposal?

There are a few.

Hamas has responded to the latest US-proposed ceasefire with demands for a pathway to a permanent ceasefire, instead of a temporary one where the Israeli government could unilaterally restart hostilities as they did in March.

They have also called for a full withdrawal of Israeli forces from the Gaza Strip and the resumption of aid and assistance to the besieged area.

What are the key differences in this proposal and the one Witkoff relayed to Hamas?

Witkoff proposed a 60-day pause in hostilities. After that, the parties (Israel and Hamas) would work to agree to extend the pause.

The issue with this is that the last time it happened, Israel unilaterally decided to cut aid to Gaza and started bombing it. To avoid a similar scenario, Hamas has tried to negotiate on the timeline for releasing the captives, 10 of them alive and 18 bodies of those killed during the war. Witkoff’s proposal called for the release to take place within a week of the 60-day pause.

However, Hamas fears Israel will resume its bombing campaign upon the release of the captives, so it has called for staggering their release throughout the pause.

It has called for a set list of negotiation topics to avoid what has happened in past negotiations with Israel, where Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu added provisions in what critics say was an attempt to derail talks and prolong the war.

According to the website Drop Site News, Hamas also reinserted a provision from the May 25 agreement that Israel had withdrawn.

That provision would be for Hamas to hand over the governing of Gaza to “an independent technocratic committee”.

What is the US reaction to Hamas’s additions?

Witkoff called Hamas’s response “totally unacceptable” and said it “only takes us backward”.

“Hamas should accept the framework proposal we put forward as the basis for proximity talks, which we can begin immediately this coming week,” he wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

“That is the only way we can close a 60-day ceasefire deal in the coming days in which half of the living hostages and half of those who are deceased will come home to their families and in which we can have at the proximity talks substantive negotiations in good-faith to try to reach a permanent ceasefire.”

I received the Hamas response to the United States’ proposal. It is totally unacceptable and only takes us backward.

Hamas should accept the framework proposal we put forward as the basis for proximity talks, which we can begin immediately this coming week.

That is the only…

— Office of the Special Envoy to the Middle East (@SE_MiddleEast) May 31, 2025

US President Donald Trump previously said the two sides were nearing a deal.

What is Israel saying?

The US and Israel seem to be in agreement on the terms.

Israel claims its officials agreed with the US proposal for a 60-day ceasefire.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Israel “backed and supported” the new proposal.

Netanyahu criticised the Hamas response, parroting Witkoff and laying the blame on the Palestinian group for failing to accept the proposal.

“As Witkoff said, Hamas’s response is unacceptable and sets the situation back. Israel will continue its action for the return of our hostages and the defeat of Hamas,” Netanyahu said.

If the US and Israel agree, why is Hamas holding out?

Hamas is wary of past instances where Israel chose to unilaterally break the ceasefire. That happened in March, when Netanyahu decided to block all aid from entering Gaza and restart the war.

Tamer Qarmout, an associate professor at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, described the negotiations between Hamas and Israel as taking place with “no good faith whatsoever”.

“They [Israel] are fixated on one key goal, which is Hamas’s capitulation and surrender, and disappearing from the scene,” Qarmout told Al Jazeera.

“Hamas is engaged in these negotiations just to try to reduce the horrors of the war, to allow some humanitarian aid to enter and to also look for a dignified exit. No one in Hamas wants to see themselves surrendering this way.”

What happens now?

In the interim, Israel is continuing to attack Gaza.

On Sunday, Israeli forces opened fire on Palestinians who had gathered at aid distribution sites run by a US-backed group, Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in southern and central Gaza. At least 31 people were killed in Rafah and another near the Netzarim Corridor.

Meanwhile, residential homes across Gaza are still being bombed relentlessly.

Activist Greta Thunberg says silence is more dangerous than sailing to Gaza, as she boarded a vessel that will try to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza. The Gaza Freedom Flotilla had to abandon its last attempt on May 2 when it was bombed.

At least 30 Palestinians were killed when Israeli forces opened fire on Palestinians waiting for aid near a distribution hub in Rafah, run by the controversial Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. The attack comes amid disputes over the text of a US-backed ceasefire proposal.

Israel has killed at least 32 Palestinians waiting to get food at two aid distribution sites in Gaza, leaving more than 200 others injured.

Israeli tanks opened fire on thousands of civilians gathered at a distribution site in southern Gaza’s Rafah on Sunday morning, killing at least 31 people, according to Al Jazeera Arabic.

Soon after, a Palestinian was reportedly killed in a shooting at a similar distribution point south of the Netzarim Corridor in Gaza City.

The aid is being distributed by Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a controversial group backed by Israel and the United States, which has completed a chaotic first week of operations in the enclave.

The United Nations and other aid groups have refused to cooperate with the GHF, accusing it of lacking neutrality and suggesting the group has been formed to enable Israel to achieve its stated military objective of taking over all of Gaza.

‘Killed for seeking one meal for children’

Ibrahim Abu Saoud, who witnessed the attack on aid seekers in Rafah, told The Associated Press news agency that Israeli forces opened fire on people as they moved towards the distribution point.

Abu Saoud, 40, said the crowd was about 300 metres (328 yards) away from the military. He said he saw many people with gunshot wounds, including a young man who died at the scene.

“We weren’t able to help him,” he said.

Al Jazeera’s Hind Khoudary, reporting from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, said Palestinians are being killed while trying to secure “one meal for their children”.

“This is why Palestinians have been going to these distribution points, despite the fact that they know that they are controversial. They [distribution points] are backed by the US and Israel, but they do not have any other option,” she said.

“[Even] the food parcels that were distributed to Palestinians are barely enough. We are talking about one kilo of flour, a couple of bags of pasta, a couple of cans of fava beans – and it’s not nutritious. It’s not enough for a family in Gaza nowadays.”

The GHF told the AP that Israeli soldiers fired “warning shots” as Palestinians gathered to receive food. The group denied reports that dozens of people were killed, describing them as “false reporting about deaths, mass injuries and chaos”.

The Israeli army said in a statement on the Telegram messaging app that it was “currently unaware of injuries caused by [Israeli] fire within the humanitarian aid distribution site” and that the incident was still under review.

The Government Media Office in Gaza condemned the attacks, describing the GHF’s distribution points as “mass death traps, not humanitarian relief points”.

“We confirm to the entire world that what is happening is a systematic and malicious use of aid as a tool of war, employed to blackmail starving civilians and forcibly gather them in exposed killing points, managed and monitored by the occupation army and funded and politically covered by … the US administration,” it said in a statement.

Speaking from Gaza City, Bassam Zaqout of the Palestinian Medical Relief Society said the current aid distribution mechanism had replaced 400 former distribution points with just four.

“I think there are different hidden agendas in this aid distribution mechanism,” he told Al Jazeera. “The mechanism does not cater to the needs of the people, such as the elderly and people with disabilities.”

Palestinian group Hamas, which runs the enclave’s government, released a statement, saying the Israeli shootings were a “blatant confirmation of premeditated intent” as it held Israel and the US fully responsible for the killings.

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) said the killings were a “full-fledged war crime” and demanded international intervention to “stop this ongoing massacre and impose strict accountability mechanisms”.

Sunday’s killings capped a deadly first week for the project’s operations, coming on the back of two earlier shootings at two distribution points in the south – the first in Rafah, the second west of the city – which saw a combined total of nine Palestinians killed.

In Gaza, crucial aid is only trickling in after Israel partially lifted a more than two-month total blockade, which brought more than two million of its starving residents to the brink of a famine.