A first boat loaded with food is on its way this Wednesday to the Gaza Strip where the population is threatened by famine, in addition to bombings. Faced with the insufficiency of aid arriving by land in the territory devastated by months of war, the international community is seeking to diversify delivery routes.
The Spanish NGO’s boat Open Arms, loaded with 200 tonnes of food, left the Cypriot port of Larnaca on Tuesday, using a corridor set up by the EU and several countries. It should take “several days” to arrive on the shores of Gaza, according to Laura Lanuza, spokesperson for this organization. According to the Vessel Finder website, the ship was moving early Wednesday at very low speed and was still about 155 nautical miles from the Gaza Strip, or a little more than 285 kilometers. Cyprus, the closest EU country to Gaza, announced that it was preparing a second, “much larger” load.
Information to remember
⇒ Borrell denounces the use of hunger as a “weapon of war”
⇒ Unrwa denounces a “war against children”
⇒ Morocco sends aid to Gaza via Israeli territory
Gaza: Josep Borrell denounces the use of hunger as a “weapon of war”
The head of European diplomacy Josep Borrell denounced Tuesday the use of hunger “as a weapon of war” in Gaza, during a speech to the UN Security Council. “This humanitarian crisis is not a natural disaster, it is not a flood or an earthquake, it is caused by humans,” he declared, calling for the entry of humanitarian aid into the Palestinian territory where the Israeli offensive has so far left 31,184 dead, mostly civilians, according to the Hamas Ministry of Health.
“When we study alternative routes to deliver aid, by sea or by air, we must remember that we have to do it because the usual land route is closed. Artificially closed,” he insisted. . “And starving the population is used as a weapon of war.” “While we condemn this in Ukraine, we must use the same words for what is happening in Gaza,” he further stressed.
Unrwa denounces a “war against children”
More children have been killed in the Gaza Strip in four months of war with Israel than in four years of conflicts across the world, the head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (Unrwa) assured Tuesday. ). “Dizzying. The number of children allegedly killed in just four months in Gaza is higher than the number of children killed in four years in all conflicts around the world,” wrote Philippe Lazzarini on X, denouncing a “war on children”.
His message referred to United Nations figures that 12,193 children were killed in conflicts around the world between 2019 and 2022. He compared these figures to reports from the Health Ministry in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip. , indicating that more than 12,300 children died in the Palestinian territory between October and the end of February. “This war is a war against children. It is a war against their childhood and their future,” declared Philippe Lazzarini.
Gaza: a “pilot project” to bring in aid directly
Humanitarian aid trucks entered the famine-threatened northern Gaza Strip on Tuesday as part of a “pilot project” by the Israeli army, she announced early Wednesday.
“In accordance with government directives, six trucks carrying humanitarian aid from the World Food Program (WFP) entered the northern Gaza Strip last night (Tuesday) through ‘Gate 96’ of the security fence “, the Israeli army said in a brief statement.
Morocco sends aid to Gaza via Israeli territory
Morocco announced that it had sent 40 tonnes of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip by land from Tel Aviv airport on Tuesday. The food aid arrived at Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport before being transferred to the Kerem Shalom crossing point between Israel and Gaza, where it was handled by the Palestinian Red Crescent, said a Moroccan diplomatic source to AFP.
“Morocco is the first country to transport its humanitarian aid via this unprecedented land route,” said the Moroccan Ministry of Foreign Affairs in a press release. Israeli authorities did not immediately confirm whether this was the first use of the route.
US military sends ships to temporary port in Gaza
Four US military boats left a Virginia base on Tuesday, carrying around 100 soldiers and equipment needed to build a temporary port in Gaza to deliver humanitarian aid. The first, an imposing gray logistics support building, moved slowly away from the pier of the Langley-Eustis base, on the Atlantic coast, while the music of Star Wars The Imperial March was broadcast over loudspeakers.
Three smaller ships followed on a roughly 30-day journey to the shores of Gaza to build a temporary port, announced by President Joe Biden in his State of the Union address to Congress on July 7. March.
Lebanon: two dead in new Israeli strikes
The Israeli army carried out new strikes on Tuesday in eastern Lebanon, killing two people according to a security source, after Hezbollah announced having launched around a hundred rockets on Israeli military positions. The Lebanese Islamist movement claimed to be acting in retaliation for an Israeli air strike which had already left one dead the day before near Baalbeck, a Hezbollah stronghold in the east of the country, bordering Syria.
A Lebanese security source told AFP that two people were killed and 12 others injured in the new strikes on the Baalbeck region. These strikes completely destroyed a building at the entrance to Sariine, about 20 km south of Baalbeck, and targeted a building in the locality of al-Nabi Chit, according to the same source. Hezbollah indicated Tuesday evening that its fighters had been killed by Israeli fire, without further details.
The Israeli army on Tuesday confirmed airstrikes against “two Hezbollah military command centers in the Baalbeck region […] in response to rocket fire towards northern Israel”. She also announced in the evening that she had carried out a strike on “two Hezbollah military infrastructures” in Syria.