Israel on Saturday said it had killed a World Central Kitchen worker it accused of taking part in the Hamas-led attack that started the war in Gaza last year, in the second Israeli strike to kill workers affiliated with the aid group.
World Central Kitchen, a U.S.-based relief group, said in a statement on Saturday that an Israeli airstrike had hit a vehicle carrying “colleagues,” but that it “had no knowledge that any individual in the vehicle had alleged ties” to the Hamas-led attack. The group added that it was pausing operations in Gaza, where a dire humanitarian crisis is unfolding for some two million people.A spokeswoman for the group, Linda Roth, said that three World Central Kitchen contractors were killed in the strike. “To the best of our knowledge, no WCK team members are affiliated with Hamas,” she said in an email.
The Israeli military said that the person it targeted had taken part in the Oct. 7 attack on Kibbutz Nir Oz, an Israeli village near the Gaza border where dozens of people were abducted. He had been monitored by Israeli “intelligence for a while and was struck following credible information regarding his real-time location,” the military said.
It added that it had targeted “a civilian unmarked vehicle and its movement on the route was not coordinated for transporting of aid.”
Ms. Roth said that the vehicle was not branded, and that the aid group was investigating the situation. The Israeli military did not immediately respond to questions about the two aid workers who were not accused of taking part in the Oct. 7 attack.
COGAT, the Israeli agency responsible for coordinating aid deliveries into Gaza, said it had demanded that World Central Kitchen investigate its hiring practices after the strike on the vehicle.
“All World Central Kitchen contractors are queried against the U.S. government’s OFAC list,” Ms. Roth said, referring to a U.S. Treasury list of people, institutions and countries considered national security threats. “Staff employees undergo additional background checks.”
The strike and the accusation that followed threatened to reignite tensions between Israeli officials and aid workers, who have criticized each other over a year of war and worsening conditions in Gaza. Relief groups have accused Israel of allowing too few supplies into the territory and hindering the flow of aid; Israeli officials say they do not restrict the amount of aid that can enter Gaza and argue that aid agencies should be doing more.
Aid workers operating in Gaza also face the dangers of the ongoing war and widespread lawlessness in the territory. A large convoy of trucks was “violently looted” in Gaza this month, according to the main U.N. agency that helps Palestinians, known as UNRWA.
Saturday’s suspension of aid work was not the first time that World Central Kitchen, a disaster relief organization founded by the celebrity chef José Andrés, had paused operations during the Gaza conflict.
In early April, the group said it was freezing work in Gaza and across the region after seven of its workers were killed in an Israeli airstrike.
After an investigation, the Israeli military called that attack a “grave mistake” and cited a series of failures, including a breakdown in communication and violations of the military’s operating procedures.
The aid group resumed operations a few weeks later with local Palestinian employees, and it remains one of several aid providers that have operated in the territory, which faces a high risk of famine and crises of mass displacement, disease under conditions of wintry weather and continued fighting.
In March, World Central Kitchen became the first group in nearly 20 years to deliver aid to Gaza by sea, briefly using a makeshift jetty fashioned from rubble. The U.S. military also attempted to use a temporary pier to get aid into Gaza, but shut down the project this summer because of rough seas.
Israel has also accused a handful of UNRWA employees of participating in the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attacks. U.N. investigators in August cleared 10 employees of the agency, which says it submits its employees’ information to Israel, and fired nine other workers because of possible involvement.
Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations criticized the investigation, and in October the Israeli lawmakers passed two laws that could threaten its work by barring operations in the country.
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