U.S. contractors tell the AP their colleagues are shooting at Palestinians seeking food in Gaza

Beersheba, Israel – American entrepreneurs keeping aid distribution sites in Gaza use live ammunition and dizzy grenades while hungry Palestinians rush for food, according to accounts and videos obtained by the Associated Press.

Two American entrepreneurs, addressing the AP under the guise of anonymity because they revealed the internal operations of their employers, said they presented themselves because they were disturbed by what they considered dangerous and irresponsible practices. They said that the security staff hired was often not qualified, not assessed, strongly armed and seemed to have an open license to do whatever they wanted.

They said their colleagues regularly launched stunning grenades and pepper towards the Palestinians. An entrepreneur said that bullets had been drawn in all directions – in the air, in the ground and sometimes to the Palestinians, recalling at least one case where he thought that someone had been hit.

“There are injured innocent people. Unnecessarily,” said the entrepreneur.

He said American staff on sites were monitoring those who come to seek food and document anyone considered “suspect”. He said they share such information with the Israeli army.

The videos provided by one of the entrepreneurs and taken on the sites show hundreds of crowded Palestinians between the metal doors, jostling for help in the noise of the balls, stunned grenades and the pepper gas sting.

Other videos include a conversation between English -speaking men discussing how to disperse the crowds and encourage each other after gusts of shots. NBC News has not obtained or examined the videos.

The testimonies of entrepreneurs – combined with videos, internal reports and SMS obtained by the AP – offer a rare overview within the Gaza Humaninian Foundation, the newly created secret American organization supported by Israel to feed the population of the Gaza Strip. Last month, the United States government promised $ 30 million for the group to continue operations – the first American donation known to the group, whose other sources of funding remain opaque.

In a statement published in response to the AP report, GHF said that it had launched an investigation, which included the examination of the videos, and concluded that the claims of history are “categorically false” and have questioned the credibility of the report. The organization added that they were pursuing legal action against the media.

Journalists were unable to access the GHF sites, located in soldiers controlled by soldiers. The new AP and NBC cannot independently check the stories of entrepreneurs.

On Wednesday, officials in Switzerland initiated procedures to dissolve the GHF Geneva branch, citing legal shortcomings in its creation, reported Reuters.

The group was recorded in the American state of Delaware and had recorded an affiliate in Geneva on February 12. The Federal Supervisory Authority for Foundations (ESA), a Swiss regulatory body, told Reuters that the GHF had not fulfilled certain legal requirements, in particular the correct number of members of the board of directors, a postal address or a Swiss bank account.

“GHF confirmed to ESA that it had never carried out activities in Switzerland … and that it intends to dissolve the registered gender (branch),” the ESA said in a statement obtained by Reuters.

A spokesperson for Safe Reach Solutions, the logistics company subcontracted by GHF, said at the AD that there had been no serious injury to any of their sites to date. In dispersed incidents, security professionals have pulled live bullets in the ground and far from civilians to attract their attention. This happened at the start of the “height of despair where crowd control measures were necessary for the safety and safety of civilians,” said the spokesperson.

The 2 million Palestinians in Gaza live a catastrophic humanitarian crisis. Since Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, 2023, triggering the 21 -month war, Israel has bombed and besieged the strip, leaving a lot of repurchase by the famine, according to food security experts.

For 2 1/2 months before the opening of GHF in May, Israel prevented all food, water and medicines from entering Gaza, saying that Hamas was flying the aid transported under a pre -existing system coordinated by the United Nations. He now wants GHF to replace this United Nations system. The UN says that its assistance operations in Gaza do not imply armed guards.

More than 57,000 Palestinians in Gaza have been killed since the war broke out, according to the Ministry of Health of the Territory, which does not distinguish between civilians and activists.

GHF is an American organization, registered in Delaware and created in February to distribute humanitarian aid during the ongoing Gaza humanitarian crisis. Since GHF sites began to operate more than a month ago, the Palestinians say that Israeli troops have opened fire almost every day towards crowds on roads heading to distribution points, through Israeli military areas. Several hundred people have been killed and hundreds of others injured, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health and witnesses.

In response, the Israeli army says that it only draws warning fire and investigation into civil damage reports. He deliberately denies shooting innocent civilians and says that he examines how to reduce “friction with the population” in areas surrounding the distribution centers.

AP reports for this article focus on what is happening on the sites themselves. The Palestinians arriving on the sites say they are taken between Israeli and American fires, said the entrepreneur who shared videos with the AP.

“We came here to get food for our families. We have nothing, ”he said the Palestinians saying to him. “Why the [Israeli] The army shoots us? Why are you shooting us?

A GHF spokesperson said there were “direct interest” people to see him fail and are ready to do or say almost anything to get there. The spokesman said that the team was made up of experienced logistics, logistics and security professionals with in-depth experience in the field. The group says that it distributed the equivalent of more than 50 million meals in Gaza in its staple food boxes.

The GHF says that it has always shown a compassionate commitment to the inhabitants of Gaza.

Throughout the war, the aid distribution was marred by chaos. The gangs looted help trucks traveling in distribution centers and crowds of desperate people also unloaded trucks before reaching their destination. Earlier this month, at least 51 Palestinians were killed and more than 200 injured while waiting for the UN and the commercial trucks entering the territory, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health and a local hospital. The Israeli army has recognized several victims while the soldiers opened fire on the crowd approaching and said that the authorities would investigate.

AP spoke to the two entrepreneurs for UG Solutions, an American outfit subcontracted to hire security personnel for distribution sites. They said that bullets, dizzy grenades and pepper spray were used at almost all distributions, even if there was no threat.

Help videos being distributed on the AP sites seem to save the frantic scenes described by entrepreneurs. The images were taken in the first two weeks of its distributions – halfway through operations.

In a video, which seems to be highly armed American security entrepreneurs in one of the Gaza sites discuss how to disperse the nearby Palestinians. It was heard of it that he had organized a “force demonstration” by Israeli tanks.

“I don’t want it to be too aggressive,” he adds, “because it’s soothing.”

At that time, shots of gunshots burst nearby, at least 15 shots. “Who! Whoo! ” An entrepreneur howls.

“I think you hit one,” says one of them.

Then comes a cry: “Hell, yeah, my boy!”

The view of the camera is obscured by a large mound of earth.

The entrepreneur who took the video told AP that he had seen other entrepreneurs shooting in the direction of the Palestinians who had just recovered their food and to leave. The men pulled both a tower above the site and at the top of the mound, he said. The shooting started because the entrepreneurs wanted to disperse the crowd, he said, but it was not clear why they continued to shoot while people walked away.

The camera does not show who turned or what was going on. But the entrepreneur who filmed him said that he had watched another fire entrepreneur to the Palestinians, then saw a man about 60 meters (meters) – in the same direction where the bullets were fired – fall on the ground.

This has happened at the same time that men were heard to speak-immerse themselves effectively, he said. In other videos provided by the entrepreneur, men in gray uniforms – colleagues, he said – can be seen by trying to clear the Palestinians who are pressed in a narrow and fenced passage leading to one of the centers. Men shoot peppery gas and throw dizzy grenades that explode in the middle of the crowd. The noise of gunshots can be heard. The entrepreneur who took the video said that the security personnel are generally pulling on the ground near the crowd or the neighboring towers above the head.

During a single distribution in June, the entrepreneurs used 37 stunning grenades, 27 projectiles of “scatrche” in rubber and 60 cans of pepper gas, according to internal text communications shared with AP.

This count does not include live ammunition, said the entrepreneur who provided the videos.

A photo shared by this entrepreneur shows a woman lying in a donkey cart after saying that she had been struck in the head with part of a deafening grenade.

Internal report by Safe Reach Solutions, the logistics company subcontracted by GHF to manage the sites, revealed that assistance seekers had been injured in 31% of the distributions that took place in a period of two weeks in June. The report did not specify the number of injuries or the cause. SRS told AP that the report refers to non -serious injuries.

More videos show frantic scenes from Palestinians being executed to collect remaining boxes of food on a single site. Hundreds of young men lean near the barriers with a low metal content, transferring food from the boxes to the bags while the entrepreneurs on the other side of the barriers tell them to stay behind.

Some Palestinians are grimacing and touch spray with pepper. “Do you enjoy this pepper spray? Yurk”, maybe a man close to the camera in English.

SRS admitted that he was facing large hungry populations, but said that the environment was secure, controlled and guarantees that people can get the help they need in complete safety.