GAZA CITY:
Gaza civil defence agency said Israeli army fire killed 27 Palestinians, 12 of them near aid distribution areas.
However, Jordanian and Emirati planes dropped food into Gaza on Sunday, as Israel began a limited “tactical pause” in military operations to allow the UN and aid agencies to tackle a deepening hunger crisis.
UN emergency relief coordinator Tom Fletcher welcomed the tactical pauses, saying he was in “contact with our teams on the ground who will do all we can to reach as many starving people as we can in this window”.
But the UN’s World Food Programme said a third of the population of Gaza had not eaten for days, and 470,000 people were “enduring famine-like conditions” that were already leading to deaths.
The Israeli decision came as international pressure mounted on Netanyahu’s government to head off the risk of mass starvation in the territory.
Germany’s Chancellor Friedrich Merz joined the chorus of concern on Sunday, urging Netanyahu “to provide the starving civilian population in Gaza with urgently needed humanitarian aid now.”
Since Israel imposed a total blockade on aid entering Gaza on March 2, the situation inside the territory has deteriorated sharply. More than 100 NGOs warned this week of “mass starvation”.
Though aid has trickled back in since late May, the UN and humanitarian agencies say Israeli restrictions remain excessive and road access inside Gaza is tightly controlled.
The Jordanian military said its planes, working with the United Arab Emirates, had delivered 25 tonnes of aid in three parachute drops over Gaza on Sunday. Truckloads of flour were also seen arriving in northern Gaza through the Zikim area crossing from Israel, according to AFP journalists.
The charity Oxfam’s regional policy chief Bushra Khalidi warned that the supply could prove insufficient.
“Starvation won’t be solved by a few trucks or airdrops,” she said. “What’s needed is a real humanitarian response: ceasefire, full access, all crossings open, and a steady, large-scale flow of aid into Gaza.
“We need a permanent ceasefire, a complete lifting of the siege.”
In general, humanitarian officials are deeply sceptical airdrops can deliver enough food safely to tackle the hunger crisis facing Gaza’s more than two million inhabitants.
In Gaza City’s Tel al-Hawa district, 30-year-old Suad Ishtaywi said her “life’s wish” was to simply feed her children. She spoke of her husband returning empty-handed from aid points daily.
