DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — The U.N. food agency accused Israel of using tanks, snipers and other weapons to fire on a crowd of Palestinians seeking food aid, in what the territory’s Health Ministry said was one of the deadliest days for aid-seekers in over 21 months of war.

Sharaa vowed to protect minority groups including the Druze and the Alawites, who formerly dominated power in Syria. But after almost 15 years of civil war that left the country’s institutions and economy largely wrecked,

The Israeli military has killed at least 67 people waiting for UN aid lorries in northern Gaza, the territory's Hamas-run health ministry says. The UN World Food Programme said its 25-truck convoy "encountered massive crowds of hungry civilians which came under gunfire", soon after it crossed from Israel and cleared checkpoints.

An Israeli undercover force detained Marwan Al-Hams, a senior Gaza Health Ministry official, outside the field hospital of the International Committee of the Red Cross in the southern Gaza Strip on Monday,

At least 73 people were killed and around 150 people injured by Israeli gunfire in Gaza while seeking aid on Sunday, according to the Palestinian health ministry.

It is one of the highest reported death tolls among repeated recent cases in which people have been killed while looking for aid.

A spokesperson for Israeli police said in a statement Friday that police were carrying out an investigation into the death of a Palestinian American that allegedly occurred following a confrontation.