'Disconnected from reality': Israel rejects Gaza statement from Canada, 24 other nations
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The signatories — who include the foreign ministers of France, Japan and the U.K. — called Israel's aid distribution system 'dangerous.'
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The ministers also condemned Hamas for continuing to hold hostages captured from Israel in the Oct. 7, 2023, attack and called for their immediate release.
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They said it's 'horrifying that over 800 Palestinians have been killed while seeking aid.' That death toll is based on figures released by the UN human rights office and the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza.
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Oren Marmorstein, spokesman for Israel's foreign affairs ministry, said Israel rejects the joint statement, calling it 'disconnected from reality' and saying it 'sends the wrong message to Hamas.'
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'The statement fails to focus the pressure on Hamas and fails to recognize Hamas's role and responsibility for the situation. Hamas is the sole party responsible for the continuation of the war and the suffering on both sides,' Marmorstein wrote in a social media statement.
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'At these sensitive moments in the ongoing negotiations, it is better to avoid statements of this kind.'
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Marmorstein said that Hamas is solely to blame for the lack of movement on a ceasefire and on releasing the hostages. He accused Hamas of 'deliberately' increasing tensions and civilian harm at humanitarian aid stations.
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The ministers who signed the statement are calling on the Israeli government to lift all restrictions on aid delivery and to 'enable the UN and humanitarian NGOs' to do their work safely and effectively.
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'The suffering of civilians in Gaza has reached new depths. The Israeli government's aid delivery model is dangerous, fuels instability and deprives Gazans of human dignity. We condemn the drip feeding of aid and the inhumane killing of civilians, including children, seeking to meet their most basic needs of water and food,' the ministers wrote.
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The ministers decry proposals by Israeli officials to concentrate Palestinians in Gaza into one city. It also takes aim at the Israeli government's proposed expansion of settlements in the Palestinian territories it occupies, particularly as it seeks to divide the West Bank from East Jerusalem.
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This would 'critically undermine the two-state solution,' the statement said, noting an increase in the building of settlements that Canada deems illegal, at a time when 'settler violence against Palestinians has soared.'
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