JERUSALEM: Israel said Monday that more humanitarian aid will enter Gaza as it announced two additional checkpoints for examining relief supplies before dispatching them to the Palestinian territory through Rafah gateway.
International aid organizations have struggled to get supplies to desperate Gazans under Israeli bombardment, with only the Rafah crossing in Egypt open.
No new direct crossings will be opened, Israel stressed on Monday, but the Nitzana and Kerem Shalom crossings will be used to carry out checks before sending the trucks through Rafah.
“This is being done to improve the volume of security screenings of aid entering Gaza via the Rafah Crossing and will enable us to double the amount of humanitarian aid entering Gaza,” the army said on X.
UN humanitarian agency OCHA said Sunday that around 100 trucks per day were bringing humanitarian supplies from Egypt into Gaza since a week-long truce ended on December 1, compared with a daily average of 500 before the war.
The additional checkpoints will screen “trucks containing water, food, medical supplies and shelter equipment,” according to a joint statement from the Israeli army and COGAT, the defense ministry body responsible for Palestinian civilian affairs.
It emphasised that “no supplies will be entering the Gaza Strip from Israel,” only via Egypt.
The UN General Assembly will meet Tuesday to discuss the humanitarian crisis, after the United States last week vetoed a Security Council resolution for a cease-fire.
Heavy urban battles raged Monday in the bloodiest-ever war in Gaza, with more than 18,200 Palestinians and 104 Israeli soldiers reported dead.
Israel’s assault on Gaza was triggered after Hamas, which rules the territory, launched a bloody attack on southern Israel on October 7 that left 1,200 people dead, mostly civilians, according to Israeli officials.
Israel says two border crossings to examine Gaza aid
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Israel says two border crossings to examine Gaza aid
- The UN General Assembly will meet Tuesday to discuss the humanitarian crisis, after the United States last week vetoed a Security Council resolution for a cease-fire
Extermination of Palestinians must stop: African Union chair
ADDIS ABABA: The “extermination” of the Palestinian people must end, the chairman of the African Union Commission Mahmoud Ali Youssouf said on Saturday as he launched the organization’s 39th summit.
“In the Middle East, Palestine and the suffering of its people also challenge our consciences. The extermination of this people must stop,” said Youssouf, who was elected to head the institution a year ago.
The Gaza Strip, a small territory surrounded by Israel, Egypt, and the Mediterranean Sea, has been under a very strict Israeli siege since the start of the war triggered by Hamas’s deadly attack on October 7, 2023.
That attack resulted in the deaths of 1,221 people on the Israeli side, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official data.
Since then, at least 71,667 Palestinians have been killed in the small coastal territory by Israel’s retaliatory military campaign, according to Gaza’s health ministry.
He also touched on the multiple conflicts raging in Africa.
“From Sudan to the Sahel, to eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, in Somalia and elsewhere, our people continue to pay the heavy price of instability,” Youssouf said.
The summit brings together heads of state from the 55 member states of the African Union over two days.
This year’s theme is water sanitation.
