Last week, a senior UN aid official told the Security Council that at least 576,000 people in the Gaza Strip – a quarter of the population – were one step away from famine.
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Amid global pressure to mitigate the crisis, two Israeli officials said on Wednesday that the government would begin allowing aid to be transported directly from its territory to northern Gaza and would also cooperate in establishing the sea route from Cyprus.
Aid groups said it had become almost impossible to deliver supplies within much of Gaza due to difficulty coordinating with the Israeli military, ongoing hostilities and a breakdown in public order.
It is more difficult to deliver aid to the north.
Trucks carrying humanitarian aid must proceed from the Rafah crossing with Egypt or the Kerem Shalom crossing with Israel, both on the southern end of Gaza, through the conflict zone to reach the largely isolated areas in the north.
An Israeli tank approaches the border with the Gaza Strip in southern Israel. credit: GT
Last week, the Israeli military's attempt to facilitate the movement of aid ended in tragedy when Israeli forces shot or trampled to death more than 100 Palestinians in a melee.
On Wednesday, hundreds of people ran along a coastal road on the outskirts of Gaza City to collect bags of flour, boxes of water and canned food donated by Turkey and Egypt that were part of a shipment trucked in from southern Gaza.
British Foreign Secretary David Cameron met with Benny Gantz, a visiting member of Israel's war cabinet, and pressed him to increase the flow of aid to Gaza.
“We still don't see improvement on the ground. This has to change,” Cameron said in a statement posted on X, formerly known as Twitter.
Pressure on Biden
US President Joe Biden's administration faced growing calls from fellow Democrats on Wednesday to push Israel to ease the devastating humanitarian crisis in Gaza, with some saying they might try to withhold military aid if conditions for civilians do not improve.
US President Joe Biden.credit: Bloomberg
“We need to use all the leverage we have,” Sen. Chris Van Hollen, a Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee, told reporters. “I don’t know how many more children will starve before we use all of our leverage.” “Here, but they really need to do more.”
Van Hollen and other lawmakers called on the administration to halt military aid to Israel if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government does not take steps such as opening crossings into Gaza to aid shipments.
Talks are on hold
Talks on a ceasefire and hostage exchange between Israel and Hamas reached an impasse on Wednesday, as the humanitarian crisis in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip sparked growing Western concern and a Houthi attack on a ship in the Gulf of Aden killed at least two people.
Negotiators from Palestinian activists, Qatar and Egypt – not Israel – are trying to reach a 40-day ceasefire before the month of Ramadan, which begins early next week.
Biden urged Hamas to accept the terms on the table, and said on Tuesday that its ally Israel was cooperating and a “reasonable offer” had been made for a ceasefire in exchange for the release of the Israeli hostages.
“The matter is in the hands of Hamas now,” he told reporters.
The United States is concerned about the possibility of the conflict in Gaza spreading to the Middle East, especially after a series of attacks on ships in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden by Houthi forces allied with Iran and acting in solidarity with the Palestinians.
In the latest attack, at least two sailors were killed in a Houthi attack on a cargo ship, US and British officials said, the first deaths reported since the Yemeni group began strikes against shipping in one of the world's busiest sea lanes.
AP, Reuters
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