Israeli forces fire on people waiting for aid in Gaza, killing 25: Witnesses, hospitals
Deir al-Balah (Gaza Strip) (AP): Israeli forces and drones opened fire toward hundreds of people waiting for aid trucks in central Gaza early Tuesday, killing at least 25 people, Palestinian witnesses and hospitals said.
The Israeli military did not immediately comment.
The Awda hospital in the urban Nuseirat refugee camp, which received the victims, said the Palestinians were waiting for the trucks on the Salah al-Din Road south of Wadi Gaza.
Witnesses told The Associated Press that Israeli forces opened fire as people were advancing eastward to be close to the approaching trucks.
“It was a massacre,” said Ahmed Halawa. He said tanks and drones fired at people, “even as we were fleeing. Many people were either martyred or wounded”.
Hossam Abu Shahada, another eyewitness, said drones were flying over the area, watching the crowds first, then there was gunfire from tanks and drones as people were moving eastward. He described a “chaotic and bloody” scene as people were attempting to escape.
He said he saw at least three people lying on the ground motionless and many others wounded as he fled the site.
The Awda hospital said another 146 Palestinians were wounded. Among them were 62 in critical condition, who were transferred to other hospitals in central Gaza, it said.
In the central town of Deir al-Balah, the Al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital said it received the bodies of six people who were killed in the same incident.
The deaths were the latest in Israel-Hamas war in Gaza which killed about 56,000 Palestinians, according to the strip's health ministry.
The ministry doesn't distinguish between civilians and combatants but say more than a half of the dead were women and children.
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Two injuries, one DNF, a DQ as India end messy World Relays campaign
Gaborone (Botswana) (PTI): Amoj Jacob and Ragul Kumar got injured during the men's 4x400m and 4x100 races respectively as India ended their World Athletics Relays campaign in disappointment on the second day of competitions here on Sunday.
The Indian camp had high hopes of making the 2027 World Championships in the men's 4x400m relay but the team did not finish (DNF) the race as Jacob suffered cramps and pulled out of the race after taking the baton from the first leg runner Dharamveer Choudhary. Rajesh Ramesh and Vishal TK were to run in the third and fourth legs.
Those teams which could not qualify for the 2027 Beijing World Championships by reaching the final round of each of the six relay events on Saturday were given another chance in the second qualification round on Sunday.
The top two teams in each of the two heats (in all six relay events) booked the Beijing ticket on Sunday.
India will now have to try and qualify for the World Championships through the Top Lists of the World Athletics, which is a long and tedious process.
In the men's 4x100m race, third leg runner Ragul Kumar fell down the track after failing to hand over the baton inside the exchange zone to fourth leg runner Gurindervir Singh, which clearly showed the lack of coordination among the runners.
Harsh Santosh Raut and Animesh Kujur ran the first two legs.
The Indian quartet was disqualified and Kumar was seen being taken away from the Field of Play with the help of the volunteers.
It was a comedy of errors in the case of the women's 4x100m race, which saw the baton being dropped during an exchange between first leg runner Tamanna and second runner Nithya Gandhe, though the Indians finished the race in 53.09 seconds.
Gandhe started running quite a distance, but after realising that the baton was not in her hand, she turned and ran back to pick it up.
The only silver-lining for the Indian contingent was the national record time in the mixed 4x100m relay race, though the quartet of Ragul Kumar, Nithya Gandhe, Animesh Kujur and Sneha SS finished sixth in heat number two with a time of 41.35 seconds, bettering the previous national mark of 42.30 seconds set in March in Chandigarh.
The mixed 4x400m relay quartet of Theerthesh P Shetty, Kumari Saloni, Nihal William and Rashdeep Kaur ended at fifth in heat number one with a time of 3 minutes and 19.40 seconds.
On Saturday, all the five Indian relay teams had failed to make it to the respective final rounds and thus missed out on the 2027 World Championships berths.
