Hopes for a truce in the Gaza Strip between Israel and the Islamist movement Hamas seem to be revived, as the first humanitarian aid boat finished unloading its cargo on Saturday in the Palestinian territory threatened with famine, and a second could leave soon.
Read “Butter and Bombs”
Meanwhile, Israeli bombardments continued in the Gaza Strip where 36 members of the same family were killed in the Nuseirat refugee camp (center) during a night marked by 60 airstrikes, after the Hamas Ministry of Health.
PHOTO AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Palestinians carry a victim pulled from the rubble of a family home hit by Israeli bombardment in the Nusseirat refugee camp on March 16.
“This is my mother, my father, my aunt, my brothers,” Mohammad al-Tabatibi, 19, told AFP, showing bodies lined up in Al-Aqsa hospital in Deir al-Balah, including include those of at least two young children, according to AFP images.
“They bombed the house while we were inside” and the family was preparing sohour, the meal before dawn of the Ramadan fast which began Monday, he continued.
Asked by AFP, the Israeli army did not confirm being behind the strike. However, it indicated in a press release that it had targeted “several terrorists holed up” in the Nuseirat camp.
The war in the Gaza Strip was sparked on October 7 by an unprecedented attack by Hamas commandos infiltrated from Palestinian territory in southern Israel, which resulted in the deaths of at least 1,160 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP count based on official Israeli sources.
According to Israel, around 250 people have been kidnapped and 130 of them are still hostages in Gaza, 32 of whom are believed to have died.
In retaliation, Israel promised to annihilate the Palestinian Islamist movement which it considers terrorist, following the example of the United States and the European Union (EU) in particular. His army launched an offensive that left 31,553 people dead in the Gaza Strip, mostly civilians, according to the Hamas Ministry of Health.
Operation on Rafah?
After more than five months of war, the United States, Qatar and Egypt, mediator countries, are trying to reach an agreement on a truce and an exchange of hostages held in Gaza for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel, after having failed to do so before the start of Ramadan.
Hamas, which took power in the Gaza Strip in 2007 and until now demanded a definitive ceasefire from Israel before any agreement, said Friday it was ready for a six-week truce, during which 42 hostages – women, children, the elderly and the sick – could be released in exchange for 20 to 50 Palestinian prisoners for each hostage released.
The movement also calls for the “withdrawal of the army from all towns and populated areas”, the “return of the displaced” and the entry of at least 500 trucks of humanitarian aid per day into Gaza, said one of its members. executives at the AFP.
PHOTO PROVIDED BY THE ISRAELI ARMY VIA ASSOCIATED PRESS
The barge towed by the boat of the Spanish NGO, Open Arms, was transporting 200 tonnes of food.
The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, for its part, announced on Friday that an Israeli delegation would travel to Qatar as part of the negotiations, without specifying when.
Mr. Netanyahu, however, approved the army’s “action plans” for an offensive in Rafah (south), where, according to the UN, around 1.5 million Palestinians are massed. This operation, against which the United States and the UN continue to warn, could take place in the absence of a truce agreement or afterwards.
Another boat ready
In addition to raids and fighting, the UN fears widespread famine in the Palestinian territory.
PHOTO YIANNIS KOURTOGLOU, REUTERS
A police officer uses a sniffer dog to inspect the cargo ship loaded with humanitarian aid destined for Gaza on March 16 at the port of Larnaca, Cyprus.
Humanitarian aid is transported by land and enters the south of the Gaza Strip after being inspected by Israel, but remains very insufficient compared to the needs of the 2.4 million inhabitants.
In Rafah, several dozen displaced people were queuing on Saturday looking desperate to receive food provided by a charity organization before iftar, the meal to break the Ramadan fast, according to AFP photos.
Having left Cyprus on Tuesday, a boat from the Spanish NGO Open Arms carrying 200 tonnes of food from the organization World Kitchen Central (WCK) arrived on the coast of Gaza on Friday where it finished unloading its cargo on Saturday, distributed in twelve trucks.
The aid is to be used to prepare meals for residents of the northern Gaza Strip, where the humanitarian situation is particularly catastrophic.
Cypriot Foreign Ministry spokesman Theodoros Gotsis said on Saturday that a second aid boat was ready and would leave for Gaza this weekend. But, according to WCK, marine weather forecasts indicate bad weather between Sunday and the end of next week, which could delay its departure.
International efforts are increasing to try to deliver more aid, particularly by airdrops.
Germany, which joined countries participating in an aid airlift from Jordan for the first time on Saturday, announced a first airdrop of four tonnes of food over northern Gaza.
The UN, EU, US and other countries, however, insist that delivering aid by air or sea cannot replace land routes.