Khan Younis, Gaza Strip – Eighteen-year-old Hani Hammad never imagined that his daily search for flour would end with him suffocating and being trampled.On Wednesday morning, he left his tent in the al-Mawasi area of southern Gaza’s Khan Younis, where he’s been displaced from Rafah along with his seven siblings, heading to a food distribution point run by the much-criticised, United States-backed GHF.
“We left at dawn and stood among the thousands gathered. About 5am [02:00 GMT], they [US staff and Israeli army] signalled to open the gate, and people rushed forward,” Hani told Al Jazeera.
“The gate was open, but people were packed into a very narrow corridor leading to it – only about seven metres wide,” he said, struggling to catch his breath after arriving at Nasser Hospital gasping and barely conscious.
“I got in with the crowd with difficulty. Suddenly, American guards started spraying pepper spray and firing gas bombs, and people began stampeding through the corridor,” he added.
Hani Hamad was rushed unconscious to Nasser Hospital after the stampede near an aid site run by the controversial GHF [Abdullah Attar/Al Jazeera]
‘I collapsed. They trampled my face.’
“I felt like I was dying. I couldn’t move forward or backwards. I collapsed. My face and side were trampled. No one could pull me out. But God gave me a second chance,” Hani said.
He was rushed unconscious to Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis on a tuk-tuk and initially placed beside the bodies of others who had died, some from suff …
