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GAZA: Gaza’s civil defense agency said 30 people were killed by Israeli fire in the Palestinian territory on Wednesday, including 11 who were seeking aid.
Civil defense spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP that 11 people were killed and more than 100 wounded “after the occupation forces opened fire and launched several shells... at thousands of citizens” who had gathered to queue for food in central Gaza.
In early March, Israel imposed a total aid blockade on Gaza amid deadlock in truce negotiations, only partially easing restrictions in late May.
Since then, chaotic scenes and a string of deadly shootings have occurred near areas where Palestinians have gathered in hope of receiving aid.
The civil defense agency said another 19 people were killed in three Israeli strikes on Wednesday, which it said targeted houses and a tent for displaced people.
When asked for comment by AFP, the Israeli military said it was “looking into” the reports.
Israeli restrictions on media in the Gaza Strip and difficulties in accessing some areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify the tolls and details provided by the civil defense agency.
The UN humanitarian office OCHA said on Monday that its partners “continue to warn of the risk of famine in Gaza, amid catastrophic levels of acute food insecurity.”
The civil defense agency reported that at least 53 people were killed on Tuesday, as they gathered near an aid center in the southern city of Khan Yunis hoping to receive flour.
After Israel eased its blockade, the US- and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) began distributing aid in late May, but its operations have been marred by chaotic scenes and dozens of deaths.
In a statement on Tuesday, the organization said that “to date, not a single incident has occurred at or in the surrounding vicinity of GHF sites nor has an incident occurred during our operating hours.”
UN agencies and major aid groups have refused to cooperate with the foundation over concerns it was designed to cater to Israeli military objectives.
The Hamas attack which triggered the war resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, according to Israeli official figures.
The Gaza health ministry said on Tuesday that 5,194 people have been killed since Israel resumed major operations in the territory on March 18, ending a two-month truce.
The overall death toll in Gaza since the war broke out has reached 55,493 people, according to the health ministry.

WASHINGTON: A powerful American bunker-busting bomb is the only weapon capable of destroying Iran’s deeply buried nuclear facilities, making it President Donald Trump’s weapon of choice if he chooses to militarily back Israel.

The GBU-57, a 30,000-pound (13,607 kg) warhead capable of penetrating 200 feet (61 meters) underground before exploding, is missing from Israel’s arsenal despite its stated goal of preventing Iran from building a nuclear bomb.

In less than a week, the Israeli army has taken out Iranian military commanders and damaged numerous surface installations, raising more questions than answers.

“The regime’s missile stockpiles, launchers, military bases, production facilities, nuclear scientists, military command and control has taken a very severe beating,” said Behnam Ben Taleblu, director of the Iran program at the Washington-based think tank Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), a conservative-leaning group.

“But there are still outsized questions as to how efficacious of a strike Israel had against the beating hearts of Iran’s nuclear program,” Taleblu said.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has reported no damage at Fordo, a uranium enrichment plant south of Tehran. Unlike the Natanz and Isfahan sites in central Iran, Fordo is buried deep underground, beyond the reach of Israeli bombs.

“All eyes will be on Fordo, which is buried under about 300 feet of rock in central Iran,” Taleblu said.

Former US Army lieutenant general and Rand Corporation defense researcher Mark Schwartz insists that “only the United States has the conventional capacity” to destroy such a site.

And by “conventional capacity,” he means the non-nuclear GBU-57 bomb.

The US military says the GBU-57 – also named Massive Ordnance Penetrator – “is designed to penetrate up to 200 feet underground before exploding,” navigating through rock and concrete.

This differs from missiles or bombs that typically detonate their payload near or upon impact.

“To defeat these deeply buried targets, these weapons need to be designed with rather thick casings of steel, hardened steel, to sort of punch through these layers of rock,” said Masao Dahlgren, a fellow working on missile defense for the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a Washington-based research center.

The 6.6-meter-long GBU-57 also has a specialized fuse because “you need an explosive that’s not going to immediately explode under that much shock and pressure,” Dahlgren said.

Design for this bomb began in the early 2000s, and an order for 20 units was placed with Boeing in 2009.

The only aircraft capable of deploying the GBU-57 is an American B-2 Bomber, a stealth aircraft.

Some of these bombers were deployed in early May on Diego Garcia, the site of a joint UK-US military base in the Indian Ocean, but were no longer visible by mid-June, according to AFP’s analysis of satellite imagery provided by Planet Labs.

With their long-range capabilities, B-2s departing from the United States “are able to fly all the way to the Middle East to do bombing runs. That’s been done before,” Dahlgren said.

Each B-2 can carry two GBU-57 bombs, and Schwartz said multiple bombs will likely be needed.

“They’re not going to just be one and done,” he said.

Schwartz added that the air superiority Israel has established over Iran reduces the risks faced by the B-2 bombers.

Such a US intervention would come with “a lot of political baggage for America,” Taleblu said, emphasizing that the bunker-buster bomb is not the only way to address Iran’s nuclear program.

Without the GBU-57 bombs, and short of a diplomatic solution, Taleblu said Israelis could attack access to underground complexes like Fordo by “trying to hit entrances, collapse what they can, cut electricity” and take other measures that have already been taken at Natanz.