A British doctor who recently returned from Gaza has accused Israeli forces of systematically targeting Palestinian children collecting food, describing the gunfire patterns as resembling “a game of target practice.”
Nick Maynard, a senior surgeon who spent four weeks working at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, said he witnessed disturbing injuries among boys as young as 11 who had been shot while trying to get food for their starving families.
“I saw young teenage boys, sometimes as young as 11, 12, or 13, who had been shot at these food distribution points,” Maynard told Sky News.
“They had gone there to get food for their starving families, and they were being shot.”
What struck him most, he said, was the pattern of gunshot wounds.
“One day they’d be coming predominantly with gunshot wounds to the head or the neck, another day to the chest, another day to the abdomen,” Maynard said.
“This is not coincidental. The clustering was far too obvious to be coincidental.”
The doctor described it as “almost like a game of target practice.”
“We’re going to shoot the head today. Tomorrow, it will be the chest. The next day, it will be the testicles.’ I would never have believed this possible, unless I’d witnessed this with my own eyes,” he said.

‘Hunger and unbearable suffering’
Maynard, who has visited Gaza regularly for 15 years, said this was his third trip since the war began on October 7, 2023.
He described a collapse of medical infrastructure, widespread hunger, and unbearable suffering inside the enclave.
“There will be many, many more deaths unless the Israelis allow proper food to get in there,” he warned.
The Israeli military has denied intentionally targeting civilians at so-called aid points, but multiple international rights groups and UN officials have reported repeated attacks on food lines and convoys.
According to the Gaza Health Ministry, at least 122 people have now died of starvation-related causes since the beginning of Israel’s war against Palestinians.