Hope for a new truce in Gaza opens the way on the day when the first humanitarian aid ship, from Open Arms, was finally able to unload its cargo, 200 tons, in a territory threatened by hunger. All this on the day when Israeli attacks on Palestinian territory continued and 36 members of the same family died in the Nuseirat refugee camp (in the center), in a bloody night marked by 60 air strikes in successive waves.
“They are my mother, my father, my aunt and my brothers,” said Mohammad al-Tabatibi, 19, as he showed the bodies at the Al-Aqsa hospital in Deir al-Balah. “I don’t know why they bombed the house.” The Israeli army indicated in a statement that it had hit “several terrorists in the Nuseirat camp,” but did not acknowledge having destroyed the al-Tabatibi home.
Hamas, which until now demanded a definitive ceasefire, now declares itself willing to accept a six-week truce during which 42 kidnapped people – women, children, elderly people and the sick – would be released in exchange for between 20 and 50 prisoners. Palestinians. In this context, Hamas demands the withdrawal of the Israeli army from “all cities and populated areas” and the “return of the displaced”, as well as the entry of at least 500 trucks a day with humanitarian aid into Gaza.
Antony Blinken, American Secretary of State, has indicated that the mediating countries, which were unable to reach an agreement before Ramadan Monday, were working towards this end. The office of Israeli Prime Minister Beniamin Netanyahu had announced that an Israeli delegation had traveled to Qatar to negotiate. The White House remained “cautiously optimistic.”
The UN fears widespread hunger in the northern Palestinian territories, devastated by war and difficult to access. This Saturday, the Open Arms ship, which had left Cyprus on Tuesday, managed to reach port and unload 200 tons of food from the World Kitchen Central (WCK) organization.
“All the cargo is now ready to be prepared and distributed,” said WCK, which said it was preparing a second aid ship in Cyprus with hundreds of tons of food. This Saturday, Open Arms launched a message on the social network X in which it highlighted the end of “twenty years of naval blockade in the Gaza Strip.” The Israeli army, which said it had taken all security measures, detailed that “the cargo was transported in 12 trucks from the WCK organization, which will distribute it to the north of the Gaza Strip.”
“Although any increase in aid to Gaza is vital, entry by land is what allows for a large-scale response,” UNRWA warned in a statement. “Humanitarian actors have stated that deliveries by sea and air are much more expensive and inefficient than sending trucks by land,” she added.
