Over the weekend, Hamas militants opened fire on a United Nations team operating in the southern Gaza Strip, according to Major General Ghasan Alyan, head of the Israeli military’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT).
General Alyan accused Hamas of attempting to disrupt the expansion of humanitarian efforts in the region. “Hamas is desperate to thwart the expansion of the humanitarian response to the southern Gaza Strip,” he stated. “We will not allow it to once again create false narratives of a crisis in the Strip.”
The report, based on information provided to COGAT by UN representatives, alleges that armed Hamas operatives threatened the UN team, fired shots, and then seized control of their vehicles. The militants reportedly used the vehicles to erect a sand barrier on the route designated for aid convoys, effectively blocking access for future deliveries.
The targeted route was part of Israel’s broader humanitarian effort intended to support the growing civilian population relocating from Gaza City to the southern Strip. Planned aid shipments included food, medical supplies, tents, and shelter equipment.
General Alyan accused Hamas of deliberately creating obstacles to humanitarian aid in order to manufacture a crisis and generate international pressure. “Hamas repeatedly proves that it has no interest in the welfare of Gaza’s residents — only in advancing its terror agenda,” he said. “Even when Israel works with the UN and international organizations to expand humanitarian aid, Hamas chooses to sabotage these efforts and, in doing so, continues to abandon the people it claims to represent.”
He condemned the attack on UN personnel and reaffirmed that Israel would continue exposing what he described as Hamas’s “cruelty” and efforts to manipulate the international narrative.