in the north of Gaza, the chaotic delivery of humanitarian convoys

In Gaza, if nothing changes, famine in the north of the enclave is inevitable. Not enough trucks are passing through and efforts by prominent Gazan families to organize distribution have been sabotaged by the Israeli army, Palestinians say. In a video posted on Instagram, Abdelkader Sabbah explains how the Israeli army is suspected of wanting to hinder the security and storage of humanitarian aid in the northern part of the enclave. He is a journalist and documents what is happening in the north.

Contacted by franceinfo, he explains that the distribution of humanitarian aid had become chaotic. The convoys were stopped on the road a few hundred meters after the Israeli military roadblock. They were pillaged by thousands of people to the detriment of communities further north who had difficulty accessing aid.

“The Israeli army did not appreciate this situation”

The UN therefore appealed to heads of families a few weeks ago to allow trucks to move forward and reach communities further north. “We managed to get communities and neighborhoods to organize themselves. It wasn’t easy, the sector is extremely dangerous, Judge Georgios Petropoulos, who heads UN coordination in Gaza. It’s difficult for people who are at this level of desperation and starvation to be patient and disciplined around an organization that has been more complicated than expected. We don’t know how long it will last.”

“We initially hoped to bring in 40 trucks per day. We wanted to flood the north with food. And in fact, we have between seven and eight trucks every two days.”

Georgios Petropoulos

franceinfo

According to Abdelkader Sabbah, the clans in northern Gaza therefore began to secure the convoys in coordination with the Hamas police. They allowed humanitarian aid to go further north to be stored. But he assures that the Israeli army targeted those responsible. “The Israeli army did not like this situation, so it bombed most of the warehouses that contained the food. There was no longer any safe way to distribute the aid as the army would not allow anyone to to secure, he laments. Because when security tried to be present at the intersections near the arrival of the trucks, they were bombarded. Last month, for example, there were attempts to secure the arrival of aid but people were bombarded.”

“The security services started to move away from the trucks, continues Abdelkader Sabbah, and people started rushing back to the trucks and grabbing what they could get.” Palestinian coordinators and police officials have been killed by the Israelis over the past 15 days. The Israeli army reportedly sought to recruit, without success, families to secure private convoys. Today, it affirms that it imposes no limits on humanitarian aid.