A first Spanish ship loaded with supplies left Cyprus on Tuesday for the besieged Gaza Strip, where the population on the verge of famine is desperately awaiting aid after more than five months of war between Israel and Hamas.
During the night, according to an AFP journalist in the Gaza Strip, Israeli bombings targeted Rafah, refuge for hundreds of thousands of displaced people in the south of the territory, as well as the neighboring town of Khan Younes and the town of Gaza, in the north.
These strikes left 80 dead, according to the Hamas Ministry of Health.
As the Muslim world entered the holy fasting month of Ramadan, the inhabitants of the Palestinian territory gathered Monday evening without joy, around meager meals, for a first daily breaking of the fast.
“This Ramadan doesn’t have the taste of Ramadan. It rather tastes of blood, of misery, of separation and oppression,” testified Oum Mohammed Abou Matar, a Palestinian woman who baked bread in an oven fed by pieces of cardboard.
Faced with the humanitarian emergency in the Gaza Strip, where Israel has imposed a total siege since the start of the war, the European Union wants to set up a sea route from Cyprus, the closest EU country to the coasts of the Middle East.
A first boat belonging to the Spanish NGO Open Arms left the port of Larnaca, approximately 370 kilometers from Gaza, on Tuesday morning using this corridor.
Its cargo of 200 tonnes of food is to be distributed in Gaza by the organization of Spanish-American chef José Andrés, World Central Kitchen, which already has teams in Gaza and has been responsible for building a jetty to unload the aid.
The President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, saw in the departure of this ship “a sign of hope”. “We will work hard so that many other boats follow,” she added on the social network X.
” Hurry up “
“Time is running out” to avoid famine in the northern Gaza Strip, “in the grip of a humanitarian catastrophe” due to lack of sufficient food aid, warned the director of the United Nations World Food Program (WFP), Cindy McCain .
In the north of the territory, “more than 2,000 health service employees are unable to find food to break the fast” of Ramadan, said the Hamas Ministry of Health.
In recent days, several countries have begun dropping aid shipments into the Gaza Strip.
A US military ship also left the United States on Saturday with materials needed to build a pier.
International aid, subject to the green light from Israel, is only entering the Gaza Strip, a territory of 2.4 million inhabitants where the UN fears widespread famine.
This aid mainly arrives from Egypt through the Rafah border post, but its delivery to the North is made almost impossible by looting, fighting and destruction. According to the UN, around 300,000 people are threatened with famine in this part of the territory.
“We will have them all”
The war was sparked on October 7 by an unprecedented attack carried out by Hamas commandos infiltrated from Gaza in southern Israel, which left at least 1,160 dead, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally. from official Israeli sources.
In retaliation, Israel promised to annihilate the Islamist movement, in power in Gaza since 2007, which it considers a terrorist organization along with the United States and the European Union.
Its army launched an offensive that has so far killed 31,112 people in the Gaza Strip, mostly civilians, according to Hamas’ health ministry.
Despite new discussions in early March in Cairo, the United States, Qatar and Egypt, the three mediator countries, did not manage to secure a truce agreement accompanied by a release of the hostages held in Gaza since the beginning of the war.
According to Israel, 130 hostages are still in Gaza, 31 of whom are believed to have died, out of around 250 people kidnapped on October 7.
On Monday, the army announced an airstrike during the night from Saturday to Sunday against the number 2 of the armed wing of Hamas, Marwan Issa, in the center of the Gaza Strip, without being able to say whether he had been killed.
“We will have them all,” said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, speaking of the other leaders of the Islamist movement.
To achieve “total victory” against Hamas, Benjamin Netanyahu announced an upcoming ground offensive on Rafah, a town stuck against the closed border with Egypt where, according to the UN, nearly a million and a half are massed. of Palestinians.
This prospect has sparked repeated warnings from the international community, notably the United States, Israel’s main ally, which has raised its voice in recent days by calling for a ceasefire and the entry of humanitarian aid. increased.
The office which coordinates all American intelligence agencies (ODNI) affirmed Monday that Israel “would probably face armed resistance from Hamas for years to come”, while emphasizing the risks of regional escalation involving in particular the Lebanese Hezbollah.
The Lebanese Islamist movement, ally of Hamas, claimed Tuesday to have launched “more than 100 rockets” on Israeli military positions, “in response” to airstrikes on Baalbek, in eastern Lebanon.