Israel Defense Forces chief of staff Herzi Halevi issued a rare acknowledgment for a mistaken set of airstrikes that killed seven aid workers on Monday night.
Halevi said they did not intend to kill seven aid workers with the World Central Kitchen aid organization, calling it “a mistake that followed a misidentification, at night during a war in very complex conditions. It shouldn’t have happened.”
The group of aid workers — Saifeddin Issam Ayad Abutaha, Lalzawmi Frankcom, Damian Sobol, Jacob Flickinger, John Chapman, James Henderson, and James Kirby — had unloaded more than 100 tons of aid at the Deir al Balah warehouse and left, according to the WCK. They were traveling in two armored cars branded with the WCK logo and a soft-skinned vehicle. They were traveling in a deconflicted zone and had coordinated their movements with the IDF.
Despite those efforts to ensure their safety, the Israeli military misidentified them and fired strikes at the vehicles, killing them, as Halevi said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu acknowledged the military carried out an “unintended strike … on innocent people.” There is an independent investigation that will be completed in the coming days and Halevi said they will share its findings with WCK.
Israeli officials have largely disregarded international criticism of their war efforts over the last six months and have often blamed Hamas for the effects the war has had across the Gaza Strip.
Haaretz, an Israeli media outlet, reported that the attack stemmed from poor field discipline and not from a lack of coordination.
The errant strike prompted widespread condemnation even among Israel’s allies.
President Joe Biden said he was “outraged and heartbroken” by the strike, and he criticized Israel for the number of aid workers who have been killed during the nearly six months of war.
“Even more tragically, this is not a stand-alone incident. This conflict has been one of the worst in recent memory in terms of how many aid workers have been killed. This is a major reason why distributing humanitarian aid in Gaza has been so difficult — because Israel has not done enough to protect aid workers trying to deliver desperately needed help to civilians,” Biden said. “Incidents like yesterday’s simply should not happen. Israel has also not done enough to protect civilians.”
Roughly 200 aid workers have been killed, making it one of the most deadly conflicts for aid workers in recent history, according to White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby.
Biden and his administration have repeatedly urged Israel to do more to prevent civilian casualties in their war against Hamas, sentiments he reiterated in the aftermath of Monday’s devastating strikes.
Following the strike, Biden spoke with Spanish American chef Jose Andres, who founded the World Central Kitchen, which has provided meals to civilians in conflict zones all over the world.
Andres wrote an opinion piece for the New York Times published on Wednesday addressing the killing of seven of his employees and Israel’s conduct in the war.
“Their work was based on the simple belief that food is a universal human right. It is not conditional on being good or bad, rich or poor, left or right. We do not ask what religion you belong to. We just ask how many meals you need,” he wrote. “Israel is better than the way this war is being waged. It is better than blocking food and medicine to civilians. It is better than killing aid workers who had coordinated their movements with the Israel Defense Forces.”
Netanyahu spoke with British leader Rishi Sunak, who “demanded a thorough and transparent independent investigation” of the strike and said he was appalled by the attack.
Palestinians in Gaza are in desperate need of humanitarian assistance. International food security organizations have warned about the risk of famine permeating the strip.
The president’s comments come as the U.S. is trying to convince Israel not to carry out a ground invasion into Rafah, the southernmost city in Rafah, where more than 1 million Palestinians are sheltering from the war. Israel’s military campaign began in the northern part of the strip and they have progressed south as time has gone on, but they have urged Palestinian civilians to move further south to avoid the front lines.
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The last remaining place Israel has to conduct operations is Rafah, but it’s also where more than half of Gaza’s population has sought refuge. Israeli leaders have maintained that they need to carry out full-scale operations in Rafah to complete its mission of eliminating Hamas’s military capabilities, whereas the U.S. believes there are alternatives to that.
Biden and other world leaders have warned that full-scale operations in Rafah could lead to overwhelming numbers of civilian casualties if they are not properly accounted for prior to any operations.