Israeli gunfire killed at least 17 Palestinians and wounded dozens as thousands of displaced people approached an aid distribution site of a US-backed humanitarian group in central Gaza on Tuesday, local health authorities said.

Medics said the casualties were rushed at two hospitals, the Al-Awda Hospital in Nuseirat camp in central Gaza, and the Al-Quds in Gaza City, in the north.

The Israeli military said its forces fired warning shots at “suspects who were advancing in the area of Wadi Gaza and posed a threat to the troops.” It added that it was aware of reports that several were injured, but argued numbers released by local health authorities did not align with the information they collected.

“The warning shots were fired hundreds of meters from the aid distribution site, prior to its opening hours and toward the suspects who posed a threat to the troops,” the military added.

Last week it warned Palestinians not to approach routes leading to sites of the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) between 6 pm and 6 am local time, describing these roads as closed military zones.

There was no immediate GHF comment on Tuesday’s incident.

The GHF began distributing food packages in Gaza at the end of May, overseeing a new model of aid distribution which the United Nations says is neither impartial nor neutral.

Many Gazans say they have to walk for hours to reach the sites, meaning they have to start travelling well before dawn if they are to stand any chance of receiving food.

While the GHF has said there have been no incidents at its so-called secure distribution sites, Palestinians seeking aid have described disorder, and access routes to the sites have been beset by chaos and deadly violence.

“I went there at 2 am hoping to get some food, on my way there, I saw people returning empty-handed, they said aid packages have run out in five minutes, this is insane and isn’t enough,” said Mohammad Abu Amr, 40, a father of two.

“Dozens of thousands arrive from the central areas and from the northern areas too, some of them walked for over 20 km (12 miles), only to come back home with disappointment,” he told Reuters via a chat app. He said he heard the firing but did not see what happened.

When Nizam Salama set out from his tent shelter in southern Gaza last week to get food and supplies for his family, he was shot at, was crushed by a desperate mob, and made it home alive but empty-handed.

Later on Tuesday, local health authorities said an Israeli strike on a house in Deir al-Balah in central Gaza Strip killed eight people, taking Tuesday's death toll to at least 25.

The Israeli military said separately, it intercepted one rocket fired from northern Gaza towards Israeli territories, which signalled Hamas and other militant group remained able to fire the weapons despite Israeli devastation of their arsenal.

Israel allowed limited UN-led operations to resume on May 19 after an 11-week blockade in the enclave of 2.3 million people, where experts have warned a famine looms. The UN has described the aid allowed into Gaza as “drop in the ocean.”

Witnesses said at least 40 trucks carrying flour for UN warehouses were looted by desperate displaced Palestinians as well as thieves near Nabulsi roundabout along the coastal road in Gaza City.

The war erupted after Hamas-led militants took 251 hostages and killed 1,200 people, most of them civilians, in the October 7, 2023, attack, Israel’s single deadliest day.

Israel’s military campaign has since killed more than 54,000 Palestinians, most of them civilians, according to health authorities in Gaza, and flattened much of the coastal enclave.