UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk said that the attacks launched by the Israeli occupation forces against Palestinian civilians in the Gaza Strip constitute a violation of international law and amount to war crimes.
This came in a statement issued by Turk on Tuesday, in which he addressed the civilians subjected to Israeli attacks while at humanitarian aid distribution centers in Gaza.
Turk described the attacks as "inhumane acts," stressing the need for an impartial and urgent investigation and for those responsible to be held accountable.
He stressed that Palestinians are forced to choose between "dying of hunger" or "dying by bombs while trying to obtain food."
In this context, the UN official stressed that Israel is violating international standards regarding the distribution of humanitarian aid.
He pointed out that Israel's intentional obstruction of civilians' access to food and other vital supplies could constitute a war crime.
By deliberately starving Gaza, paving the way for forced displacement, Israel has pushed 2.4 million Palestinians into starvation by closing the crossings for more than 90 days to humanitarian aid, particularly food, according to the government media office in the enclave.
For its part, the Israeli army admitted to shooting at Palestinians near an aid distribution center in the Al-Alam area of Rafah, claiming there was "suspicious activity" toward its forces.
The "aid" is being distributed in so-called "buffer zones" amid growing signs that this plan is failing. Distribution operations have been repeatedly interrupted in recent days due to the influx of large numbers of hungry people, prompting Israeli forces to open fire, leaving civilians dead and wounded.
The amounts of aid distributed are described as "very scarce" and do not meet the needs of hundreds of thousands of hungry people in the Strip.
The distribution process is carried out according to a mechanism described by human rights and international organizations as "humiliating and degrading," with those in need forced to pass through iron cages enclosed in barbed wire, a scene observers have likened to the practices of the Nazi ghettos in Europe during World War II.
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UN: Israel's attacks on civilians in Gaza amount to war crimes