US contractors say their colleagues are firing live ammo as Palestinians seek food in Gaza

BEERSHEBA, Israel — American contractors guarding aid distribution sites in Gaza are using live ammunition and stun grenades as hungry Palestinians scramble for food, according to accounts and videos obtained by The Associated Press.

Two U.S. contractors, speaking to the AP on condition of anonymity because they were revealing their employers' internal operations, said they were coming forward because they were disturbed by what they considered dangerous and irresponsible practices. They said the security staff hired were often unqualified, unvetted, heavily armed and seemed to have an open license to do whatever they wished.

They said their colleagues regularly lobbed stun grenades and pepper spray in the direction of the Palestinians. One contractor said bullets were fired in all directions — in the air, into the ground and at times toward the Palestinians, recalling at least one instance where he thought someone had been hit.

"There are innocent people being hurt. Badly. Needlessly,'' the contractor said.

He said American staff on the sites monitor those coming to seek food and document anyone considered ''suspicious.'' He said they share such information with the Israeli military.

Videos provided by one of the contractors and taken at the sites show hundreds of Palestinians crowded between metal gates, jostling for aid amid the sound of bullets, stun grenades and the sting of pepper spray. Other videos include conversation between English-speaking men discussing how to disperse crowds and encouraging each other after bursts of gunfire.

The testimonies from the contractors — combined with the videos, internal reports and text messages obtained by the AP — offer a rare glimpse inside the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, the newly created, secretive American organization backed by Israel to feed the Gaza Strip's population. Last month, the U.S. government pledged $30 million for the group to continue operations — the first known U.S. donation to the group, whose other funding sources remain opaque.

Journalists have been unable to access the GHF sites, located in Israeli military-controlled zones. The AP cannot independently verify the contractors' stories.

A spokesperson for Safe Reach Solutions, the logistics company subcontracted by GHF, told the AP that there have been no serious injuries at any of their sites to date. In scattered incidents, security professionals fired live rounds into the ground and away from civilians to get their attention. That happened in the early days at the ''the height of desperation where crowd control measures were necessary for the safety and security of civilians,'' the spokesperson said.

Aid operation is controversial

Gaza's more than 2 million Palestinians are living through a catastrophic humanitarian crisis. Since Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, setting off the 21-month war, Israel has bombarded and laid siege to the strip, leaving many teetering on the edge of famine, according to food security experts.

For 2 1/2 months before GHF's opening in May, Israel blocked all food, water and medicine from entering Gaza, claiming Hamas was stealing the aid being transported under a preexisting system coordinated by the United Nations. It now wants GHF to replace that U.N. system. The U.N. says its Gaza aid operations do not involve armed guards.

Over 57,000 Palestinians in Gaza have been killed since the war erupted, according to the territory's Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and militants.

GHF is an American organization, registered in Delaware and established in February to distribute humanitarian aid during the ongoing Gaza humanitarian crisis. Since the GHF sites began operating more than a month ago, Palestinians say Israeli troops open fire almost every day toward crowds on roads heading to the distribution points, through Israeli military zones. Several hundred people have been killed and hundreds more wounded, according to Gaza's Health Ministry and witnesses.

In response, Israel's military says it fires only warning shots and is investigating reports of civilian harm. It denies deliberately shooting at any innocent civilians and says it's examining how to reduce ''friction with the population'' in the areas surrounding the distribution centers.

AP's reporting for this article focuses on what is happening at the sites themselves. Palestinians arriving at the sites say they are caught between Israeli and American fire, said the contractor who shared videos with the AP.

''We have come here to get food for our families. We have nothing,'' he recounted Palestinians telling him. ''Why does the (Israeli) army shoot at us? Why do you shoot at us?''

A spokesperson for the GHF said there are people with a ''vested interest'' in seeing it fail and are willing to do or say almost anything to make that happen. The spokesperson said the team is composed of seasoned humanitarian, logistics and security professionals with deep experience on the ground. The group says it has distributed the equivalent of more than 50 million meals in Gaza in its food boxes of staples.

GHF says that it has consistently shown compassionate engagement with the people of Gaza.

Throughout the war, aid distribution has been marred by chaos. Gangs have looted trucks of aid traveling to distribution centers and mobs of desperate people have also offloaded trucks before they've reached their destination. Earlier this month, at least 51 Palestinians were killed and more than 200 wounded while waiting for the U.N. and commercial trucks to enter the territory, according to Gaza's Health Ministry and a local hospital. Israel's military acknowledged several casualties as soldiers opened fire on the approaching crowd and said authorities would investigate.

Videos, texts, internal reports document havoc at food sites

AP spoke to the two contractors for UG Solutions, an American outfit subcontracted to hire security personnel for the distribution sites. They said bullets, stun grenades and pepper spray were used at nearly every distribution, even if there was no threat.

Videos of aid being dispensed at the sites seen by the AP appear to back up the frenetic scenes the contractors described. The footage was taken within the first two weeks of its distributions — about halfway into the operations.

In one video, what appear to be heavily armed American security contractors at one of the sites in Gaza discuss how to disperse Palestinians nearby. One is heard saying he has arranged for a ''show of force'' by Israeli tanks.

''I don't want this to be too aggressive," he adds, "because this is calming down.''

At that moment, bursts of gunfire erupt close by, at least 15 shots. ''Whoo! Whoo!'' one contractor yelps.

''I think you hit one,'' one says.

Then comes a shout: ''Hell, yeah, boy!''

The camera's view is obscured by a large dirt mound.

The contractor who took the video told AP that he saw other contractors shooting in the direction of Palestinians who had just collected their food and were departing. The men shot both from a tower above the site and from atop the mound, he said. The shooting began because contractors wanted to disperse the crowd, he said, but it was unclear why they continued shooting as people were walking away.

The camera does not show who was shooting or what was being shot at. But the contractor who filmed it said he watched another contractor fire at the Palestinians and then saw a man about 60 yards (meters) away — in the same direction where the bullets were fired — drop to the ground.

This happened at the same time the men were heard talking — effectively egging each other on, he said.

In other videos furnished by the contractor, men in grey uniforms — colleagues, he said — can be seen trying to clear Palestinians who are squeezed into a narrow, fenced-in passage leading to one of the centers. The men fire pepper spray and throw stun grenades that detonate amid the crowd. The sound of gunfire can be heard. The contractor who took the video said the security personnel usually fire at the ground near the crowds or from nearby towers over their heads.

During a single distribution in June, contractors used 37 stun grenades, 27 rubber-and-smoke ''scat shell'' projectiles and 60 cans of pepper spray, according to internal text communications shared with the AP.

That count does not include live ammunition, the contractor who provided the videos said.

One photo shared by that contractor shows a woman lying in a donkey cart after he said she was hit in the head with part of a stun grenade.

An internal report by Safe Reach Solutions, the logistics company subcontracted by GHF to run the sites, found that aid seekers were injured during 31% of the distributions that took place in a two-week period in June. The report did not specify the number of injuries or the cause. SRS told the AP the report refers to non-serious injuries.

More videos show frenzied scenes of Palestinians running to collect leftover food boxes at one site. Hundreds of young men crowd near low metal barriers, transferring food from boxes to bags while contractors on the other side of the barriers tell them to stay back.

Some Palestinians wince and cough from pepper spray. ''You tasting that pepper spray? Yuck,'' one man close to the camera can be heard saying in English.

SRS acknowledged that it's dealing with large, hungry populations, but said the environment is secure, controlled, and ensures people can get the aid they need safely.

Verifying the videos with audio analysis

To confirm the footage is from the sites, AP geolocated the videos using aerial imagery. The AP also had the videos analyzed by two audio forensic experts who said they could identify live ammunition — including machine-gun fire — coming from the sites, in most cases within 50 to 60 meters of the camera's microphone.

In the video where the men are heard egging each other on, the echo and acoustics of the shots indicate they're fired from a position close to the microphone, said Rob Maher, a professor of electrical and computer engineering at Montana State University and an author and research expert in audio forensic analysis. Maher and the other analyst, Steven Beck, owner of Beck Audio Forensics, said there was no indication that the videos' audio had been tampered with.

The analysts said that the bursts of gunfire and the pop sequences in some of the videos indicated that guns were panning in different directions and were not repeatedly aimed at a single target. They could not pinpoint exactly where the shots were coming from nor who was shooting.

GHF says the Israeli military is not deployed at the aid distribution sites. Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, an army spokesman, said the army is not stationed at the sites or within their immediate proximity, especially during operating hours. He said they're run by an American company and have their own security.

One of the contractors who had been on the sites said he'd never felt a real or perceived threat by Hamas there.

SRS says that Hamas has openly threatened its aid workers and civilians receiving aid. It did not specify where people were threatened.

American analysts and Israeli soldiers work side by side, contractors say

According to the contractor who took the videos, the Israeli army is leveraging the distribution system to access information.

Both contractors said that cameras monitor distributions at each site and that American analysts and Israeli soldiers sit in a control room where the footage is screened in real time. The control room, they said, is housed in a shipping container on the Israeli side of the Kerem Shalom crossing into Gaza.

The contractor who took the videos said some cameras are equipped with facial recognition software. In live shots of the sites seen by the AP, some videos streams are labeled ''analytics" — those were the ones that had the facial recognition software, said the contractor.

If a person of interest is seen on camera — and their information is already in the system — their name and age pops up on the computer screen, said the contractor. Israeli soldiers watching the screens take notes and cross-check the analysts' information with their own drone footage from the sites, he said.

The contractor said he did not know the source of the data in the facial recognition system. The AP could not independently verify his information.

An internal SRS report from June seen by the AP said that its intel team would circulate to staff a ''POI Mugs Card,'' that showed photos of Palestinians taken at the sites who were deemed persons of interest.

The contractor said he and other staff were told by SRS to photograph anyone who looked ''out of place.'' But the criteria were not specified, he said. The contractor said the photos were also added to the facial recognition database. He did not know what was done with the information.

SRS said accusations that it gathers intelligence are false and that it has never used biometrics. It said it coordinates movements with Israeli authorities, a requirement for any aid group in Gaza.

An Israeli security official who was not named in line with the army's protocol, said there are no security screening systems developed or operated by the army within the aid sites.

It was a rushed rollout, the contractors say

The several hundred contractors hired by UG Solutions landed in Israel in mid-May, not long before the first GHF site opened on May 26.

The rollout was jumbled and lacked leadership, the two contractors told the AP. Some of the men had been recruited only days prior via email asking if they wanted to work in Gaza. Many had no combat experience and were not properly trained in offensive weapons, they said.

SRS did not provide the staff with draft rules of engagement until three days after distributions started, they said. The draft rules, seen by the AP, say deadly force may be used only under extreme necessity and non-lethal weapons may be used in an extreme situation on unarmed individuals who are physically violent.

The Palestinians seen in the videos don't appear to be physically aggressive. SRS says there have been occasional altercations at the sites between aid seekers, but none have involved its staff.

Each contractor was equipped with a pistol, stun grenades, tear gas and an Israeli-made automatic rifle capable of firing dozens of rounds within seconds, said the contractor who took the videos.

In an email from May shared with the AP by a third party, one high-ranking contractor wrote to the head of UG Solutions and called the operation ''amateur hour.'' He wrote that the sites did not have enough staff or resources making them ''not sustainable'' and ''not safe,'' according to the email, seen by the AP.

The two contractors said none of the men in Israel working for UG Solutions were tested to see if they could handle a gun safely. One said the rushed rollout also meant not everyone could ''zero'' their weapon — adjust it to one's personal specifications to ensure proper aim. Military experts say not zeroing a weapon poses a significant risk.

A spokesperson for UG Solutions, Drew O'Brien, said UG has an extensive recruiting and training process, including "a detailed application process, screening by experts, reference checks, background checks and weapons proficiency.'' The group said it prides itself on repeated quality control checks once missions are underway.

O'Brien said the group was unaware of video showing gunfire from someone believed to be a UG Solutions contractor. He said he couldn't comment on the allegations without seeing the videos.

The two contractors warned that if the organization continues as is, more lives will be at risk. ''If operations continue in this manner, innocent aid seekers will continue to be needlessly injured," said the contractor who took the videos. ''And possibly killed."

___

Associated Press reporter Josef Federman contributed.