Israel Aid reaches people in Gaza - "Drops in the ocean"
After an eleven-week blockade by Israel, the first relief supplies have arrived days late for people in need in the Gaza Strip. 87 trucks with goods such as flour, baby food and medical supplies left the Kerem Shalom border crossing on Thursday night and reached Deir al-Balah and Chan Junis in the south of the sealed-off coastal area, said Jihad Islim, Vice President of the Association of Private Freight Forwarders in Gaza. However, the quantities that have arrived so far are only a drop in the ocean, aid workers emphasized.
23.05.2025, 05:42
SDA
Some bakeries began baking bread at dawn and distributing it to the residents, bakers and other eyewitnesses reported on Thursday. Israel had lifted the almost three-month blockade on humanitarian aid on Sunday - but the trucks that were then allowed into the coastal area were stuck for days inside the Gaza Strip near the border crossing because the route proposed for them was too dangerous, according to the UN.
UN emergency aid chief: relief supplies are not enough
UN emergency relief chief Tom Fletcher welcomed the fact that the first truckloads had been delivered, but said they were only "a drop in the ocean compared to what is urgently needed". Before the Gaza war began, around 500 trucks of aid were arriving in the coastal strip every day.
"Due to insecurity, the risk of looting, delays in coordinating permits and unsuitable routes provided by the Israeli Defense Forces, which are not suitable for the transportation of goods, significant problems remain in the loading and dispatch of goods," the UN emergency relief office Ocha said.
Warning of famine
Amdschad Schawa, the director of the Palestinian NGO network in Gaza, said that no relief supplies had reached northern Gaza. However, the need there is particularly great. Aid organizations have warned of an acute famine among the 2.1 million inhabitants of the Gaza Strip. The health minister of the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, Majed Abu Ramadan, said according to the Arabic TV channel Al Jazeera that at least 29 children and elderly people had died "due to hunger" in the past few days. The information could not be independently verified.
Israel had blocked all aid deliveries at the beginning of March and resumed its military offensive two weeks later, ending a two-month ceasefire with the Islamist Hamas. This was intended to increase the pressure on the terrorist organization to release the remaining abductees. According to Israeli sources, at least 20 hostages are still being held alive in the Gaza Strip.
Israel claims that there is no shortage of aid supplies and accuses Hamas of stealing them in order to pass them on to its fighters or sell them on the black market for a profit. Hamas denies this. The UN also says that Israel has presented no evidence of this.
Netanyahu makes serious accusations against critics
Israel's new major offensive and the blockade of aid supplies have recently led to much international criticism of the country. The heads of state and government of France, Canada and the UK had "believed Hamas' propaganda that Israel is starving Palestinian children", Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu railed on Thursday. "I say to President Macron, Prime Minister Carney and Prime Minister Starmer: if mass murderers, rapists, baby killers and kidnappers thank you, you are on the wrong side of justice," he said.
Netanyahu had previously said he was allowing a limited amount of food to allow the Israeli military to continue its recently expanded ground offensive and take full control of the Gaza Strip. Israel and the USA are planning to reorganize humanitarian aid. US security companies are to set up and operate distribution centers for this purpose. According to Netanyahu, this is to take place in the coming days. Israel wants to bypass UN and other aid organizations in this way. These organizations reject the plans as they do not meet the minimum requirements for humanitarian aid.
The Gaza war was triggered by the worst massacre in Israel's history, carried out by Hamas and other terrorist groups on October 7, 2023. Around 1,200 people were killed and more than 250 were taken hostage in the Gaza Strip. According to the Hamas-controlled health authority, more than 53,600 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the start of the subsequent war. The figure does not distinguish between fighters and civilians and is almost impossible to verify independently.
