5 people were killed and 10 others were injured after the failure of an airdrop parachute to open for aid in Gaza

A paramedic at the largest hospital in Gaza said on Friday that an air drop of humanitarian aid in the northern Palestinian territories resulted in the death of five people and the injury of 10 others.

The head of the emergency department in the emergency room, Muhammad Al-Sheikh, told AFP that the victims were taken to Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City.

Al-Sheikh said that the deadly airdrop occurred north of the Beach refugee camp.

A witness from the camp told AFP that he and his brother followed the aid by parachute, hoping to get “a bag of flour.”

Muhammad Al-Ghoul said: “Suddenly, the parachute did not open and fell like a missile onto the roof of a house.”

The fifty-year-old man told AFP, “After ten minutes, I saw people transporting three martyrs and other wounded people who were staying on the roof of the house on which aid packages fell.”

The United States and Jordan were among the countries that carried out airdrops in northern Gaza, where hundreds of thousands of people face dire conditions after more than five months of war.

A Jordanian military source told AFP that the kingdom had nothing to do with the fatal fall that occurred on Friday.

The source said, “The technical defect that led to some parachutes carrying aid not opening and falling freely to the ground during the airdrop on Gaza on Friday was not caused by a Jordanian plane.”

He added, “The four Jordanian planes that carried out the airdrop in partnership with five other countries carried out their mission without any glitches.”

Referring to the five deaths on Friday, the Hamas-run government media office in Gaza said airdrops were “useless” and “not the best way for aid to enter.”

The United Nations said airdrops or the establishment of a proposed sea aid corridor could not be a substitute for land delivery, and urged that more trucks be allowed to reach Gaza through more border crossings.

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