How the rollout of new Gaza aid system collapsed into chaos

Israel and the US have defended a new system for distributing aid in the Gaza Strip, despite renewed criticism from the UN and chaotic scenes at an aid hub during its first day of operation.

A fortified compound from which US mercenaries were handing out parcels of aid was stormed by hundreds of Palestinians on Tuesday just hours after opening for the first time. Later that day, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that "there was some loss of control momentarily" at the distribution point, adding that "happily, we brought it under control".

Sky News has reviewed satellite imagery, spoken to an eyewitness and analysed footage posted on social media to understand what happened. How the incident unfolded The compound, construction of which began in mid-April, is the size of around three football pitches.

It has an entrance in the south for the mercenaries and an entrance and exit in the north for Palestinians (separated by a central reservation). The entrance pathway is around 10m (33ft) wide and is divided into five lanes by fences.

The fences do not appear to be fixed to concrete foundations, making them relatively flimsy. There is no fence around the compound as a whole – instead, it is defended only by scalable sand berms.

At first, aid distribution proceeded as planned. Palestinians queued outside the compound and, once inside, lined up to collect aid packages from staff in blue vests.

The video below shows one of the mercenaries tasked with securing the site gesturing to the hundreds of people gathered in the entrance queue. We can see in the video that the fence on the far left of the queue had already begun to sag under the weight of the crowd.

The mercenary appears unconcerned or unaware of the state of the fence. It is not clear when the mercenaries became aware of the risk that the compound would be overrun.

After the fence collapsed, people spilled out into the central reservation and climbed over the sand berm into the compound. The footage below shows the chaos that unfolded as people rushed to secure aid for themselves and their families.

Analysis of the video below shows that the bottom section of the fencing had bent and snapped. Other fences in the queue later failed as well.

The video below shows crowds of people leaving the compound carrying whatever they could find, including wooden palettes. In the video below, filmed by Palestinian journalist Tamer Qeshta, one of the compound's armed guards can be seen pleading with Palestinians to leave the area.

Speaking Arabic with a thick Iraqi accent, he warns the men that there are Israeli tanks nearby. "The mercenary was asking people to leave the area because the Israeli tanks wanted to take control and would kill anyone who remained," says Mr Qeshta.

At some point, after much of the looting had taken place, shots were fired. A video seen by Sky News shows the crowd making their way out of the compound when a gunshot rings out.

People duck and run for cover. Twenty-five seconds later, a burst of gunfire can be heard.

Over the next 10 seconds, a further four bursts are fired as the crowd, which includes children, flees. At least one Palestinian was killed and 48 others wounded, according to Gaza's health ministry.

The UN says most of the injuries were due to gunfire. The mercenary forces tasked with guarding the site have denied opening fire.

Israel says its troops nearby had fired warning shots. Speaking to reporters that evening, US State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce defended the rollout of the new aid system.

"The real story here is that the aid is moving through, and in that kind of environment it's not surprising that there might be a few issues involved," she said. 'Most of the trucks got looted' The scenes in Rafah this week come as hunger stalks the Gaza Strip.

Israel had placed the territory under a total blockade from 2 March until 19 May – 78 days in which no food, water, fuel or medicine entered the area. By the time Israel began allowing aid to enter the Strip again last week, at least 57 children had died from starvation, according to Gaza's health ministry.

Last week, a total of 388 trucks carrying flour, baby formula and medicine were allowed to enter the Gaza Strip. It was far below the 2,254 trucks that entered Gaza in a typical week before the war.

An additional 265 have entered so far this week, according to Israeli authorities. "It's not really a significant amount of food," says Sam Rose, acting director of UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, in Gaza.

"If you've got a flow of that number of trucks over three or four weeks then we can manage what we need, but we basically had five days of these supplies coming in and then it came to a halt. And most of those trucks got looted." Footage uploaded to social media last week shows Palestinian men with dozens of bags of flour, reportedly looted from a truck near Khan Younis.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) says the new aid distribution system, involving the militarised compounds, is intended to prevent looting – which it blames on Hamas. Mr Rose says Israel has provided "no evidence" that Hamas is systematically diverting aid.

He and another senior UN official told Sky News that most of the looting was carried out by armed gangs operating near the border with Israel. Mr Rose describes a "looters' valley" between Kerem Shalom and Khan Younis, where trucks are frequently attacked.

"This is a controlled military area, with a heavy presence of Israeli troops on the ground," says Mr Rose, who left Gaza in late March. "And yet armed Palestinians were able to roam pretty freely in the vicinity of these military areas – I'd say within about 200-300m of military outposts and vehicles.

They weren't running for cover, they were in plain sight." Amjad al Shawa, director of the Palestine NGO Network (PNGO), told Sky News that "no one can get there, only looters". He added that the gangs had recently spread their control to eastern Khan Younis, after the area was declared a combat zone by the IDF on 19 May.

Multiple aid officials told Sky News that the ringleader of the looters was a man called Yasser Abu Shabab. A photo posted to his Facebook page, dated 20 May, shows a Palestinian man in military gear, carrying an assault rifle.

The man appears to be signalling traffic, with UN vehicles visible in the background. Sky News was able to locate the image to a junction in "looters' alley.