Israel rejects claims it is restricting Gaza aid, says hundreds of trucks waiting
Foreign Ministry lashes UK, France and Germany for missive on shortages of supplies; evacuation warnings issued for parts of southern Gaza after rocket fired by Hamas from area
Israel pushed back Tuesday against European criticism of efforts to allow humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip, as the military carried out strikes in the north of the enclave and issued fresh evacuation orders for its south.
Responding to a call from Britain, France and Germany to deal with what UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy called “the unacceptable humanitarian situation in Gaza,” the Foreign Ministry insisted that there were no restrictions on the amount of aid entering Gaza.
“It is disappointing that the foreign ministers of the E3 (Britain, France and Germany) failed to address the October 7 massacre and the daily attacks on Israeli civilians since then in their letter,” spokesman Oren Marmorstein said in a statement.
“Israel is facilitating the entry of humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip and does not impose any restrictions on the quantity of aid entering the Strip,” he added.
Marmorstein said international organizations had failed “to distribute the aid due to looting by Hamas.”
According to the Defense Ministry’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories, or COGAT, some 780 truckloads of aid were awaiting pickup on the Gazan side of the Kerem Shalom crossing between Israel and the Gaza Strip Tuesday, after just 43 were picked up the previous day by international organizations.
On Sunday, the UN agency for Palestinians said it was pausing the delivery of aid through Kerem Shalom because of looting by armed gangs in Gaza.
In a post on X on Monday, Lammy said “Israel must implement the UN’s winter plan now: send equipment to guard against cold & flooding, give access to fuel, repair vital infrastructure, and get aid in.”
International aid organizations have repeatedly raised the alarm about the humanitarian crisis in Gaza since war broke out on October 7, 2023, with Hamas’s brutal invasion of southern Israel.
Israel says it has worked to facilitate the entry of goods into the Strip, casting blame on armed gangs, often backed by the enclave’s Hamas terror group, that have repeatedly looted aid trucks. Jerusalem has also pointed a finger at international aid organizations that it says have failed to collect or effectively distribute the aid.
UN agencies and NGOs have highlighted the difficulties in distributing aid within Gaza, citing challenges such as fuel shortages for trucks, lawlessness, and numerous restrictions they claim are imposed by Israeli military authorities on the ground, which the army says are necessary to keep aid workers out of harm’s way as it battles Hamas.
They also allege that the volume of aid is insufficient.
On Monday, the United Nations described the situation in Gaza as “horrific and apocalyptic.”
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres criticized what he saw as restrictions on aid delivery, calling current levels “grossly insufficient.”
According to COGAT, a total of 138 humanitarian aid trucks entered Gaza Monday, carrying food, medical supplies, shelter equipment, water purification equipment, and flour for bakeries.
It also announced that five ambulances donated by the United Arab Emirates to international aid organizations operating in Gaza entered the Strip Monday night.
According to COGAT, since the start of the war, it has facilitated the entry of over 120 ambulances donated by various countries to Gaza.
A World Health Organization report last month said 145 ambulances have been affected by alleged Israeli attacks.
Palestinian health officials claimed Tuesday that 14 Gazans had been killed in Israeli strikes in the north of the enclave, eight of them in the city of Beit Lahiya near the Strip’s northern border.
Four others were reported killed in Gaza City and two people were reported killed in Jabalia.
The figures, provided by officials operating under the Hamas terror group that rules the Strip, could not be verified, and did not differentiate between fighters and civilians.
The Israeli army has been operating in Jabalia and also in the towns of Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun since October. Its forces have killed hundreds of terror operatives in the three locations since the operation began, the army has said.
The Israel Defense Forces did not comment on the specific reports of strikes Tuesday.
On Monday, the army said soldiers searching a building in Beit Lahiya found several hidden explosive devices alongside a camera that had documented the operatives planting them.
The IDF has said it has killed over 1,300 terror operatives during the ongoing operation in the Strip’s far north.
More than 1,000 members of Hamas and other terror groups have been detained, according to the military.
In the central Gaza Strip, the military said Tuesday that a recent series of strikes carried out by the 990th Reserve Artillery Regiment killed numerous Hamas operatives, including at least seven who participated in the October 7 onslaught.
The operatives were named by Israel as Abd al-Razak, a Nukhba Force operative and an engineering specialist in the Central Camps Brigade; Marzouk Alhor; Abd Abu Awd Yusri; Omar Abu Abdullah; Ahmed Zahad, a Nukhba operative; and Maad Abu Gharbua.
Soldiers from other units also carried out raids in the so-called Netzarim Corridor, a belt of land where the IDF has dug in, splitting the Strip into two parts. During the raids, weapons were found and buildings used by Hamas were demolished, the army said.
The IDF also issued evacuation orders on Tuesday to residents in northern districts of Khan Younis, a town in the south of the Gaza Strip, citing a rocket that was fired at Israel from the area.
Hamas claimed responsibility Monday evening for the rocket launch, which set off sirens in two communities near the Strip before being intercepted by air defenses.
“Terror organizations are once again firing rockets at the State of Israel from your area. The specified area has been warned several times in the past,” said Col. Avichay Adraee, the IDF’s Arabic-language spokesman.
“For your own safety, you must evacuate the area immediately and move to the humanitarian zone,” he added in the post on X.
The warning prompted the hurried exodus of families Tuesday morning, largely in a westerly direction.
Fighting in Gaza has been ongoing for nearly 14 months, since Hamas-led terrorists staged a massive, unprecedented attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and abducting 251, nearly 100 of whom remain in captivity in Gaza, including dozens no longer alive.
Israel invaded the Strip with the goal of dismantling Hamas rule and freeing the hostages. Intense efforts to broker a ceasefire and hostage release deal restarted this week after a truce was clinched to halt fighting with Hamas ally Hezbollah in Lebanon, but officials say there has yet to be any significant progress on Gaza.
On Monday, US National Security Adviser John Kirby said the main obstacle to a deal continued to be Hamas.
“We believe that as they look at the world right now, they ought to see just how isolated and weakened they are,” he said. “It’s time for Hamas to come to the table.”
