Deir el-Balah, April 2 (RHC)-- Five aid workers have been killed by Israeli forces who targeted their vehicle in Gaza.   Al Jazeera’s Hind Khoudary, reporting from the al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir el-Balah, said she had spoken to the slain aid workers earlier in the day and their killing raises questions for other relief operations in Gaza.

“We know that there are five aid workers, who were working with World Central Kitchen: A Palestinian, Polish, British and Australian, and a fourth body is unrecognisable because it was severely injured.  But, according to World Central Kitchen (WCK), employees that we met in al-Aqsa Hospital, they told us that he is an international worker also,” Khoudary said.

“They were on their way back from the aid convoy, the aid shipment that reached the Gaza Strip from Cyprus earlier today.  They were on the way back to their guesthouse in Rafah when they were targeted in their vehicle near Deir el-Balah on al-Rashid Street, the main street that we [travel] through from the north to the southern area of the Gaza Strip,” Khoudary said.

Khoudary said that when she had spoken to the WCK staff earlier in the day, they said they were waiting on a “green light” to enter southern Gaza safely.  “We don’t know how they were targeted.  We know that they have been – all of the international organisations have been – closely coordinating with Israeli forces.  But this incident is horrifying and there are hundreds of other aid workers, international aid workers currently working” in Gaza, Khoudary said.

“Now the question is what is going to happen with other foreigners and international aid workers in the Gaza Strip.”