Israel announced on Friday that it was authorizing the “temporary” delivery of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip, besieged and threatened by famine, via the port of Ashdod and the Erez crossing point, the day after an unprecedented warning of its great American ally.
The Gaza Strip has been the scene for nearly six months of a devastating war between Israel and Hamas, triggered by an unprecedented attack by the Palestinian Islamist movement on Israeli soil on October 7.
According to a latest report Friday from the Hamas Ministry of Health, 33,091 people, mostly civilians, were killed there.
International pressure is increasing every day on the Israeli government, with the UN Human Rights Council demanding on Friday an end to all arms sales to Israel, in a resolution citing fears of “genocide” against the Palestinians.
American President Joe Biden raised on Thursday for the first time the possibility of conditioning American aid to Israel on “tangible” measures in the face of the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza.
Israel’s security cabinet has approved “immediate measures to increase humanitarian aid to the civilian population” in Gaza, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said in a statement Friday.
“Temporary” routing
According to this statement, Israel will authorize the “temporary” delivery of aid through the Israeli port of Ashdod, approximately 40 km north of the Gaza Strip, and through the Erez crossing point, between the territory Palestinian and southern Israel.
The Israeli authorities will also allow “the increase in Jordanian aid through Kerem Shalom”, a border post in southern Israel.
The White House immediately called on Israel to “rapidly” implement its commitments.
Israel has been carrying out a vast military operation in the Gaza Strip since the October 7 attack, carried out by Hamas commandos infiltrated from this territory. The attack led to the death of 1,170 people on the Israeli side, the majority of them civilians killed the same day, according to an AFP count based on official Israeli figures.
More than 250 people were kidnapped during the attack and taken as hostages to the Gaza Strip, where 130 are still detained, among whom, according to the Israeli army, 34 died.
Israel has vowed to annihilate Hamas, which took power in 2007 in the Gaza Strip and which is considered a terrorist organization by the United States, Israel and the European Union in particular.
The Hamas press office reported Friday airstrikes and artillery fire across the Gaza Strip, particularly in Rafah (south), where nearly 1.5 million Palestinians displaced by the fighting are crowded, and Khan Younes.
In the latter city, the Israeli army said it had destroyed “an underground terrorist infrastructure” and located weapons.
According to the Hamas Ministry of Health, 56 bodies were transported to hospitals, the majority of them children, women and the elderly.
The bombings and ground offensive by Israeli forces as well as the total siege of Palestinian territory have caused a humanitarian disaster.
“Deeply insensitive”
The death on Monday in Israeli strikes of seven humanitarian workers, a Palestinian and six foreigners, from the NGO World Central Kitchen (WCK), increased international discontent. The Israeli army recognized a “serious error”, Mr. Netanyahu referring to a “tragic incident”.
Several countries from which the victims came strongly condemned the strike, including Australia.
“I found this statement […] frankly, for the family in particular […] deeply insensitive,” Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong said of Mr. Netanyahu’s reaction in an interview with the British daily The Guardian.
“This week’s horrific attack on World Central Kitchen was not the first of its kind. It must be the last,” insisted the head of American diplomacy Antony Blinken in Brussels on Thursday.
He recalled that “100% of the population needs humanitarian aid” in Gaza.
Israel’s primary military supporter, the United States demanded from its partner a “spectacular increase” in this aid, hoping to see concrete measures taken “in the coming hours and days”.
“If we lose this respect for human life, we run the risk of not being able to differentiate ourselves from those we are fighting,” said Mr. Blinken, referring to Hamas.
After Monday’s strike, the NGO WCK announced that it was suspending its operations in Gaza, increasing fears for the 2.4 million inhabitants.
Open Arms, the Spanish organization which chartered with WCK the first humanitarian aid boat to arrive in Gaza in March, also said on Thursday that it was suspending its operations via the humanitarian corridor from Cyprus.
Security Council meeting
On Thursday, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), Oxfam, Médecins du Monde and Save the Children International warned of their near impossibility of working in Gaza.
The UN Security Council is due to hold a meeting on Friday on the situation of aid workers and the risk of famine in Gaza.
The Palestinian Red Crescent said Thursday that “31 children in (the) Gaza Strip died of starvation and dehydration.”
And according to an Oxfam study, the population of the north of this territory survives on “less than 12% of the average daily caloric needs”.
To provide assistance, several countries are carrying out airdrops, but this method cannot replace land routes, insists the UN.
The US military Command for the Middle East (Centcom) said it had dropped the equivalent of “50,680 meals” in the north of the territory on Thursday.
Joe Biden also urged Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday to conclude “without delay” an agreement for a ceasefire, while the land operation desired by the Israeli Prime Minister in Rafah is causing growing concern.