New Delhi, Aug. 25 -- Israeli forces shot dead four Palestinian aid-seekers traveling Sunday through a military zone south of Gaza City that is regularly used to reach a food distribution point, a hospital and witnesses said.

Gaza City is in famine after 22 months of war, while Israel's military moves ahead with a planned offensive to seize the city, perhaps within days. Israel's defense minister has warned that the city of hundreds of thousands of people could be destroyed.

Al-Awda Hospital and two witnesses told The Associated Press the Palestinians were killed when troops opened fire on a crowd heading to a site run by the Israeli-backed U.S. contractor Gaza Humanitarian Foundation in the Netzarim corridor area, hundreds of meters (y...