Israel
Trucks attacked by desperate people as logistical obstacles and restrictions imposed by Israel limit urgently needed aid
A new initiative by the United Nations World Food Program to deliver aid to an estimated half a million people facing starvation in northern Gaza has failed amid further scenes of chaos and violence.
A convoy of 14 trucks bound for the northern Gaza Strip was looted on Tuesday after being held at an Israeli army checkpoint for several hours, aid workers said. When the convoy turned back after the delay, it was attacked by “a large crowd of desperate people” and 200 tons of food were looted.
Insecurity, logistical bottlenecks, ongoing fighting and Israeli-imposed movement restrictions combined to limit aid deliveries to a fraction of what was needed, aid officials said.
The WFP convoy was the first to attempt to reach the northern Gaza Strip as insecurity forced the organization to suspend its efforts on February 20 despite threats of starvation after Israeli forces fired twice at desperate Palestinians trying to get food from WFP trucks, senior WFP officials told the Guardian earlier this week.
Hopes were raised last week that Hamas and Israel were close to agreeing a deal that would pause or possibly permanently end hostilities, thereby facilitating humanitarian aid.
Prospects for an agreement have diminished in recent days, but a Hamas delegation remains in Cairo for talks with mediators from Egypt and Qatar.
Israeli government spokesman Eylon Levy said Wednesday that Israel still wants a temporary pause on humanitarian grounds that would allow the release of about 130 hostages still being held by Hamas.
“We will do everything we can to get them out… [But] This war will ultimately end with the complete defeat of Hamas or its surrender,” Levy told reporters.
The war was sparked by bloody Hamas attacks in southern Israel in October. The militant organization, which has ruled Gaza since 2007, killed 1,200 Israelis, mostly civilians, and kidnapped another 250 in the surprise operation.
Health officials in Gaza said the number of people killed in Israel's offensive has now exceeded 30,700, with 86 deaths reported in the past 24 hours. Most of the victims were women and children, officials said.
Israel has accused Hamas of using civilians as human shields in Gaza and said its forces were acting entirely lawfully.
Shaban Abdel-Raouf, a Palestinian electrician and father of five from Gaza City, said: “Every day costs us dozens of martyrs. “We want a ceasefire now.”
He is now in the southern town of Khan Younis, where fighting continues. Residents reported hearing explosions throughout Tuesday night and into Wednesday morning. Witnesses said Israeli warplanes struck areas of Al-Nuseirat refugee camp and the city of Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip, as well as part of the southern city of Rafah.
Jordanian and American planes have repeatedly airdropped food in recent days, but humanitarian organizations say only road delivery can bring sufficient quantities to those in need, with no distribution mechanism in place.
“Air drops are a last resort and cannot prevent famine,” said Carl Skau, deputy director of the World Food Program.
Gaza's Ministry of Health reported on Wednesday that a 15-year-old girl was the latest child to die from malnutrition or dehydration at Shifa Hospital in Gaza City.
The United Nations said in February that more than a quarter of Gaza's 2.3 million people are “estimated to be experiencing catastrophic levels of deprivation and famine.” Without action, widespread famine could be “almost inevitable,” it said.
Aid deliveries to the southern Gaza Strip can currently be made via the Rafah border crossing from Egypt and the Kerem Shalom border crossing from Israel.
According to the United Nations Palestinian Refugee Agency (UNRWA), an average of nearly 97 trucks per day were able to enter the Gaza Strip in February, compared to about 150 trucks per day in January – well below the target of 500 trucks per day.
The United Nations has described access to aid as “unpredictable and inadequate,” blaming military operations, insecurity and extensive restrictions on the delivery of vital supplies.
Even when aid arrives in Gaza, all cargo must be unloaded from Egyptian trucks and transferred to local transport. There is now an acute shortage of both suitable vehicles and fuel in Gaza, causing further problems. Other challenges include patchy communications, limited electricity, refugee flows and rubble-strewn roads.
Israel said there would be no limit on aid to civilians and blamed the United Nations for any delivery problems. Limits on the amount and pace of aid depended on the capacity of the United Nations and other organizations.
Aid workers say the insecurity is due to a lack of police, who have stopped guarding convoys after they were attacked by Israeli forces.
Israel says police are part of Hamas and on Wednesday called on international aid groups to find ways to distribute aid that do not make them “accomplices of terrorists.”
On Friday, the United Nations Children's Fund (Unicef) delivered vaccines, formula and other supplies to Shifa and two days later managed to reach other hospitals in northern Gaza.
Tess Ingram, a spokeswoman for Unicef, told the Guardian that her colleagues had described how desperate they were in the hospitals they visited and that doctors had described being completely unable to treat dying children.
“It defies logic that children die because of access restrictions. We have the food they need and the malnutrition treatments needed to save lives just a few miles away, but we cannot bring it to them. “This is a test of the conscience of the world,” Ingram said.
Washington has increased pressure on Israel to ease the suffering, a message echoed by British Foreign Secretary David Cameron.
“People are dying of hunger. “People are dying from otherwise preventable diseases,” Cameron told the House of Lords before talks with Benny Gantz, an opposition politician who joined Israel's war cabinet shortly after the outbreak of war.
In Beirut, Osama Hamdan, a Hamas official, said a prisoner exchange could only take place after a ceasefire.
Basem Naim, a second senior Hamas official, said Hamas had submitted its own draft agreement and was waiting for a response from Israel, and that “the ball is now in the Americans' court.”
An agreement is sought before the start of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan on Sunday. Violence in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories often increases during Ramadan, as does hostility toward Israel in the Arab and Muslim world.
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