UN suspends aid deliveries through main Gaza crossing
The UN agency providing aid to Palestinians has announced it is halting deliveries through the main crossing between Israel and Gaza due to security concerns.
Philippe Lazzarini, head of UNRWA, stated that two recent aid convoys were looted by armed gangs near the Kerem Shalom crossing and called on Israel to ensure law and order is maintained.
Israel has previously asserted that it facilitates the entry of aid into Gaza, accusing Hamas of hijacking and stealing these shipments.
Kerem Shalom is the primary route for delivering humanitarian aid to Gaza’s over two million residents, who the UN has warned are facing the brink of famine.
In recent weeks, criminal gangs have increasingly resorted to violent theft, becoming the primary obstacle to aid distribution, according to aid workers.
On November 16, a convoy of 109 trucks carrying food was attacked by masked men who held the drivers at gunpoint, stealing 97 of the trucks. A notorious Gazan criminal family later blocked the main road out of Kerem Shalom for two days, setting up iron barriers and reportedly firing at trucks trying to reach an aid distribution point.
Locals and aid workers have also claimed that armed men operate openly in a restricted zone at the Israel-Gaza border, under the watch of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).
In announcing the suspension of aid deliveries, Lazzarini mentioned that the road from the crossing “has not been safe for months,” citing the theft of five more trucks on Saturday and the earlier incident. This decision also followed the deaths of three World Central Kitchen (WCK) employees and two others in an Israeli strike on Saturday, which Israel claimed targeted a WCK worker involved in the October 7 attacks.
“The delivery of humanitarian aid must never be dangerous or turn into an ordeal,” Mr Lazzarini said.
He said there had been a “breakdown of law and order” and that the responsibility to protect aid workers lay with Israel.
“They must ensure aid flows into Gaza safely and must refrain from attacks on humanitarian workers,” he said.
Israel has in recent months opened a number of other crossings into central and northern Gaza following international pressure to increase the flow of aid, but Kerem Shalom remains the one through which most aid enters Gaza.
Speaking at the UN in September, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insisted his government was allowing the equivalent of “more than 3,000 calories a day for every man, woman, and child” into Gaza.
He accused Hamas of stealing aid deliveries and selling food at exorbitant prices as a means of maintaining control in the strip.
Responding to Unrwa’s announcement, the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories, which oversees the Israeli government’s civilian policy in Gaza, said there were other humanitarian organisations delivering aid.
“We will continue to work with the international community to increase the amount of aid making its way into Gaza, through the Kerem Shalom Crossing as well as the other four crossings between Israel and Gaza,” it said.
Last month, a review by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification – which is run by the UN and a group of international charities – said the number of aid shipments crossing into Gaza was lower than at any time since the current conflict began in October 2023.
It warned that the “humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip [was] extremely grave and rapidly deteriorating”, adding that, under a “reasonable worst-case scenario, a risk of famine existed for the whole of the Gaza Strip”.
The review said “immediate action [was] required from all actors who are directly taking part in the conflict, or have influence on its conduct, to avert and alleviate this catastrophic situation”.
