Ministers approve steps to alleviate Gaza humanitarian crisis ahead of US deadline
Among measures is increase of aid trucks to war-torn Palestinian enclave, though number likely to fall short of Washington’s expectations; Israeli official says most demands met
Jacob Magid is The Times of Israel's US bureau chief
The security cabinet has approved a series of steps aimed at boosting the humanitarian situation in Gaza, ahead of the Wednesday deadline set by the US for Israel to address the crisis or risk a partial embargo on weapons from Washington, an Israeli official told The Times of Israel Monday.
The US sent Israel a letter on October 13, warning that it had 30 days to take a list of steps or risk being out of compliance with US law, which bars the transfer of offensive weapons to countries that block access to humanitarian aid.
Among the steps demanded by the US was for Israel to increase the amount of aid going into Gaza to 350 trucks per day. That number has been well under 100 on average for the past several months.
COGAT, the Israeli military body in charge of humanitarian aid to Gaza, said the drop in the number of aid trucks in October was due to closures of the crossings for the Jewish High Holidays and memorials marking the anniversary of the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack that triggered the war.
The measures approved by the security cabinet during a Sunday meeting included an unspecified increase to the amount of aid entering the Strip, though an Israeli official told the Axios website that Israel won’t be able to meet the 350-truck benchmark set by the US.
“October was a very weak month,” said an Israeli official, who spoke under condition of anonymity in line with military briefing rules. “But if you look at the November numbers, we are holding steady at around 50 trucks per day to northern Gaza and 150 per day to the rest of Gaza.”
Another measure approved by the cabinet was the inland expansion of the Muwasi coastal humanitarian zone, which the IDF has already started widening in recent weeks. On Monday the IDF announced it was also expanding the designated humanitarian zone in southern Gaza, where the vast majority of the Palestinian population in the Strip currently resides.
An Israeli official told reporters on Monday that Israel had met most demands by the US to improve humanitarian conditions in Gaza but was still discussing some items that touch on safety issues.
The official said Israel had added entrances into Gaza, expanded the humanitarian zone, increased security for aid vehicles, and managed joint task forces with the international community and many others as part of the process to improve the humanitarian situation.
Among the US demands that Israel appears to have refused is allowing the entry of 50-100 commercial trucks a day.
The official said commercial activity had been halted because Hamas was controlling the merchants. Restrictions on the entry of closed containers would also not be lifted due to security risks, the official said.
Others, including the opening of a fifth crossing into Gaza, have been implemented.
At the cabinet meeting, ministers also agreed that Israel will send a written commitment that it is not seeking to forcibly deport Gazans from combat zones, Channel 13 reported. This appears to be in response to a US demand in its letter that Israel clarify that it is not seeking to “isolate northern Gaza,” through the implementation of the so-called General’s Plan.
The plan, which the IDF has insisted it is not carrying it out, envisions the military laying siege to northern Gaza in order to prevent the resurgence of Hamas. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken asked Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to publicly do disavow the plan, but the premier declined to do so amid pressure from his far-right coalition partners, a US official told The Times of Israel last month.
It is unclear if the written commitment described by Channel 13 will be enough to assuage the administration.
The US letter made a separate, seemingly less-critical request for Israel to allow the Red Cross to visit Palestinian security prisoners amid mounting reports of abuse in Israeli prisons.
Channel 13 reported that this request was denied by the security cabinet. Hamas has refused to allow the Red Cross to visit the 97 hostages remaining in Gaza, who were among 251 abducted from Israel on October 7, 2023, when the Palestinian terror group led a massive cross-border attack on Israel that killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians, triggering the ongoing war.
Ministers during the security cabinet meeting pressed Netanyahu on why these measures were necessary, given that US President Joe Biden is on his way out and Trump is unlikely to implement any sort of arms embargo against Israel, especially in his first days in office.
Netanyahu responded that Biden could still take steps against Israel in his final two-plus months in office and that boosting the Gaza humanitarian situation would be important in mitigating such moves, Channel 13 reported.
A US official told The Times of Israel that Israel has met some of the demands that the administration made in its letter but has fallen well short of others thus far.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin conveyed a “sharp” message to his new Israeli counterpart, Israel Katz, during their first phone conversation on Friday about Washington’s humanitarian aid demands, Channel 12 reported Saturday. According to the network, Austin urged Katz to raise the issue at the Sunday cabinet meeting.
The report said Israel believes the US intends to go “all the way” in pressing Israel on this issue, rather than letting it slide because the Biden administration will be out of office in two months.
In practice, the report said, this means that if Washington is not convinced there has been a dramatic change for the better as regards aid delivery and distribution, there could be a “direct collision” on the issue of arms supplies.
Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said on Monday he had met the US ambassador and was confident that “we can reach an understanding with our American friends and that the issue will be solved.”
On Tuesday, eight international aid organizations said in a report that Israel had failed to meet the US demands to allow greater humanitarian access to Gaza. The report listed 19 measures of compliance with the US demands. It said Israel had failed to comply with 15 and only partially complied with four.
“Israel not only failed to meet the US criteria that would indicate support to the humanitarian response, but concurrently took actions that dramatically worsened the situation on the ground, particularly in Northern Gaza,” the report said. “That situation is in an even more dire state today than a month ago.”
The report was co-signed by Anera, Care, MedGlobal, Mercy Corps, the Norwegian Refugee Council, Oxfam, Refugees International and Save the Children.
Last week, a committee of global food security experts warned of a strong likelihood that famine is imminent in certain areas of northern Gaza, a claim that Israel rejected outright.
Agencies contributed to this report.
