According to the United Nations, aid supplies to Gaza were almost completely cut off last week. According to the United Nations, humanitarian groups say the amount of food, medicine and other supplies needed to be significantly increased in Gaza to address the looming famine. .
Since the war began, most aid to Gaza has been delivered through two border crossings at the southern end of the territory. Israel closed one of them, Kerem Shalom, on May 5 after a Hamas rocket attack killed four Israeli soldiers. The next day, Israeli forces captured and closed down a second unit in Rafah on the Egyptian border as part of the so-called action. “Limited operations” against Hamas have brought relief efforts to a near halt.
Six trucks of flour arrived through the Kerem Shalom crossing on Saturday, and some fuel also arrived through the same crossing on Friday, according to Juliette Touma, communications director for UNRWA’s Palestinian assistance agency. She said no other supplies had arrived via Kerem Shalom in the past week and the Rafah crossing remained closed.
“That’s all since May 6,” Mr. Touma said in a text message. “It’s basically nothing.”
COGAT, the Israeli agency that coordinates aid to Palestinians, said Sunday that Israel was “working to enable the flow of aid to Rafah” through a road that runs through part of the enclave. No additional details were provided.
The extremely limited amount of aid will almost certainly worsen the food shortages that have accumulated over the past seven months.
Before the war began last October, about 500 aid trucks and additional commercial trucks a day transported supplies to Gaza. But the number of people entering the territory through its two main border crossings has fallen by about 75% since Oct. 7, according to the United Nations. Some food has been delivered by air and sea, most recently through the Eres border crossing in northern Gaza, but aid groups say it is not enough to make up the shortfall at the main border crossing.
At the same time, Mr Touma said about 300,000 liters of fuel per day was needed for all humanitarian purposes, including running generators in hospitals and relief operations. Aid groups said last week that fuel stocks were only a few days away.
On Friday, only 157,000 liters of fuel entered Gaza, Touma said. COGAT estimated the figure at 200,000 litres. The reason for the discrepancy was not immediately clear.
“At this desperate moment, fuel shortages, exacerbated by the obstruction of humanitarian aid entering Gaza through three crossings, are holding everything back,” said Volker Turk, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. statement on Sunday.
The Israeli military said Sunday’s deadly Hamas rocket attack targeting Kerem Shalom was launched from the Rafah region in southern Gaza. When Israeli forces took over the Rafah border last week, they ordered people to evacuate the eastern side of the city. Afterwards, the military expanded the evacuation order.
Turkey’s prime minister said the evacuation order recently imposed on civilians in Rafah “could not possibly be reconciled with the binding requirements of international humanitarian law.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has insisted that a full-scale invasion of Rafah, which President Biden and other world leaders have strongly warned about, is necessary to defeat the remaining elements of Hamas, which led deadly attacks on Israel in October. 7.
According to two U.S. officials and a Western official, one of the reasons for the overall halt in aid is that Egypt, which collects and loads most of the aid to Gaza, is refusing to allow trucks heading to Kerem Shalom from the Rafah crossing. do. Those involved in the relief effort also included two Israeli officials with knowledge of the situation. U.S. and Israeli officials have said they believe Egypt is pressuring Israel to withdraw its troops from Rafah.
As rocket sirens sounded again in the Kerem Shalom region on Sunday, the Israeli military said two shots fired from Rafah were intercepted by air defenses.
