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Arab News
22 minutes ago
- Health
- Arab News
UN condemns ‘armed individuals' for looting medical supplies in Gaza
UNITED NATIONS: The United Nations condemned Friday a group of 'armed individuals' for raiding warehouses in the Palestinian territory of Gaza and looting large amounts of medical supplies. The group 'stormed the warehouses at a field hospital in Deir Al-Balah, looting large quantities of medical equipment, supplies, medicines, nutritional supplements that was intended for malnourished children,' said Stephane Dujarric, spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. The stolen aid had been brought into war-ravaged Gaza just a day earlier, he said. 'As conditions on the ground further deteriorate and public order and safety breaks down, looting incidents continue to be reported,' he said. But Dujarric highlighted the difference between Friday's event and the looting two days earlier of a UN World Food Programme (WFP) warehouse by 'starving' Palestinians, desperate for aid. 'This appeared to be much more organized and much different from the looting we'd seen... in the past days,' he said. 'This was an organized operation with armed men.' Since the beginning of last week, Israel has begun to allow a trickle of aid into the Palestinian territory, after a total blockade imposed on March 2. The UN has warned that the aid allowed through so far was 'a drop in the ocean' of the towering needs in Gaza, after the blockade created dramatic shortages of food and medicine. The UN humanitarian agency warned Friday that '100 percent of the population (are) at risk of famine.' Gaza has been decimated by Israel's punishing military offensive on the territory, which has killed at least 54,321 people, mostly civilians, according to health ministry figures the UN considers reliable. It has also reduced much of the territory to rubble, destroying hospitals, schools, residential areas and basic road and sewage infrastructure. Israel launched its offensive in response to an unprecedented Hamas attack on October 7, 2023, which resulted in the deaths of 1,218 people, also mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures. On Thursday, 'we and our humanitarian partners only managed to collect five truckloads of cargo from the Palestinian side of the Kerem Shalom crossing,' Dujarric said. 'Another 60 trucks had to return to the crossing due to intense hostilities in the area.' He rejected Israeli allegations that the UN was not collecting available aid. 'It was no longer safe to use that road,' which Israel's military had asked aid organizations to use, he said, stressing that there are 'a lot of armed gangs' operating there. The five trucks that did make it through on Thursday were carrying medical supplies for the Deir Al-Balah field hospital. And most of those supplies 'were looted today, very sadly and tragically,' Dujarric said.
BreakingNews.ie
2 hours ago
- General
- BreakingNews.ie
Hamas says it is still reviewing US proposal for Gaza ceasefire
Hamas said it was still reviewing a US proposal for a temporary ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, where 27 people were killed in new Israeli airstrikes, according to hospital officials. The ceasefire plan, which has been approved by Israeli officials, won a cool initial reaction Thursday from the militant group. Advertisement US negotiators have not publicised the terms of the proposal. A Palestinian boy injured following an Israeli airstrike is brought for treatment to the Baptist Hospital in Gaza City (jehad Alshrafi/AP) But a Hamas official and an Egyptian official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive talks, said on Thursday that it called for a 60-day pause in fighting, guarantees of serious negotiations leading to a long-term truce and assurances that Israel will not resume hostilities after the release of hostages, as it did in March. In a terse statement issued on Friday, Hamas said it is holding consultations with Palestinian factions over the proposal it had received from US envoy Steve Witkoff. While changes may have been made to the proposal, the version confirmed earlier called for Israeli forces to pull back to the positions they held before it ended the last ceasefire. Advertisement Hamas would release 10 living hostages and a number of bodies during the 60-day pause in exchange for more than 1,100 Palestinians imprisoned by Israel, including 100 serving long sentences after being convicted of deadly attacks. Each day, hundreds of trucks carrying food and humanitarian aid would be allowed to enter Gaza, where experts say a nearly three-month Israeli blockade — slightly eased in recent days — has pushed the population to the brink of famine. 'Negotiations are ongoing on the current proposal,' Qatar's ambassador to the United Nations, Alya Ahmed Saif Al-Thani said on Friday, referring to talks between her country, the US and Egypt. On Thursday, a top Hamas official, Bassem Naim, said the US proposal 'does not respond to any of our people's demands, foremost among which is stopping the war and famine'. Advertisement The uncertainty over the new proposal came as hospital officials said that 27 people had been killed Friday in separate airstrikes. Palestinians line up for food distribution in Deir al-Balah (Abdel Kareem Hana/AP) A strike that hit a tent in the southern city of Khan Younis killed 13, including eight children, hospital officials said. The Israeli military did not immediately comment. Meanwhile, the bodies of 12 people, including three women, were brought to Shifa Hospital on Friday from the nearby Jabaliya refugee camp. Advertisement The Palestinian Red Crescent Society said the bodies of two others were brought to a hospital in Gaza City. Hospital officials also said on Friday that at least 72 had been killed in Gaza during the previous day. That figure does not include some hospitals in the north, which are largely cut off due to the fighting. Since the war began, more than 54,000 Gaza residents, mostly women and children, have been killed according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants in its tally. Advertisement The war began with Hamas' October 7 2023 attack on Israel, which left around 1,200 dead. A Palestinian boy sits on the curb as he waits near a food distribution kitchen in Deir al-Balah (Abdel Kareem Hana/AP) Some Gaza residents said their hope for a ceasefire is tempered by repeated disappointment over negotiations that failed to deliver a lasting deal. 'This is the war of starvation, death, siege and long lines for food and toilets,' Mohammed Abed told The Associated Press in the central Gaza city of Deir al-Balah. 'This war is the 2025 nightmare, 2024 nightmare and 2023 nightmare.' Mr Abed said he and his family struggle to find food, waiting three hours to get a small amount of rice and eating only one meal daily. 'It's heartbreaking that people are being starved because of politics. Food and water should not be used for political purposes,' he said. Another Gaza resident, Mohammed Mreil, said about the possibility of a truce that: 'We want to live and we want them (Israelis) to live. God did not create us to die.'
The Guardian
3 hours ago
- Business
- The Guardian
Gaza is ‘hungriest place on Earth' with all its people at risk of famine, says UN
Gaza is 'the hungriest place on Earth', according to the UN, which warned on Friday that the Palestinian territory's entire population was at risk of famine. Jens Laerke, a spokesperson for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, said the territory was 'the only defined area – a country or defined territory within a country – where you have the entire population at risk of famine. One hundred per cent of the population at risk of famine,' he said. He added: 'Gaza is the hungriest place on Earth.' Laerke detailed the difficulties faced by the UN in delivering humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip. Nine hundred trucks of humanitarian aid had been authorised by Israel to enter the strip since the blockade was partially lifted, but so far only 600 have been offloaded on the Gaza side of the border, and a smaller number of shipments have then been picked up for distribution within the territory due to security considerations, he said. Laerke said the mission to deliver aid was 'in an operational straitjacket that makes it one of the most obstructed aid operations not only in the world today, but in recent history'. Once truckloads enter Gaza, they are often 'swarmed by desperate people', he said. Daniel Meron, Israel's UN ambassador, rejected the claim, saying UN agencies 'cherrypick the facts to paint an alternative version of reality and demonise Israel'. 'In a desperate effort to remain relevant, they lambast the best efforts of Israel and its partners to facilitate delivery of humanitarian aid to the civilian population. UN feeds Hamas, we make sure aid gets to those in need,' he wrote on X. Laerke's comments come after Hamas said it was 'thoroughly reviewing' Israel's response to a US proposal for a Gaza ceasefire deal, although one of the militant group's officials said the plan did not meet any of the Palestinians' 'just and legitimate demands'. Hamas has described the latest proposal as more biased in favour of Israel than previous versions. It said it was holding consultations with other 'Palestinian factions', a term referring to other groups operating under Hamas's rule in Gaza, such as Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Late on Thursday, Benjamin Netanyahu told the families of hostages held in Gaza that Israel had accepted the draft deal presented by Steve Witkoff, Donald Trump's Middle East envoy. Deep differences between Hamas and Israel have stymied previous attempts to restore a ceasefire that broke down in March after only two months when Israel renewed its offensive. Israel has insisted that Hamas disarm completely and be dismantled as a military and governing force and that all 58 hostages still held in Gaza must be returned before it will agree to end the war. The Israeli government fears a lasting ceasefire and withdrawal would leave Hamas with significant influence in Gaza, even if it surrenders formal power. With time, the Israelis fear, Hamas may be able to rebuild its military might and eventually launch more 7 October-style attacks. On the other hand, Hamas fears Israel could break the ceasefire – as it did last March – and resume the war, which the Israeli government would be permitted to do after 60 days under the terms of the deal. The militant group has rejected the demand to give up its weapons and says Israel must pull its troops out of Gaza and commit to ending the war. Netanyahu also faces political constraints: his far-right coalition partners have threatened to bring down his government if he ends the war too soon. That would leave the Israeli prime minister more vulnerable to prosecution on longstanding corruption charges and to investigations into the failures surrounding the 7 October attack. The far-right security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, said on Friday it was time to use 'full force' in Gaza. 'Mr Prime Minister, after Hamas rejected the deal proposal again – there are no more excuses,' Ben-Gvir said on his Telegram channel. 'The confusion, the shuffling and the weakness must end. We have already missed too many opportunities. It is time to go in with full force, without blinking, to destroy, and kill Hamas to the last one.' The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a private logistics group backed by the US and endorsed by Israel, expanded its food distribution to a third site on Thursday. Heavily criticised by the UN and other aid groups as inadequate and flawed, the group's operation began this week in Gaza, where the UN has said 2 million people are at risk of famine after Israel's 11-week blockade on aid entering the territory. Laerke said that by having people collect aid rather than delivering it to them where they are, they become a target for looters once they leave the site. 'It is so desperate and tragic and frustrating and wildly unhumanitarian,' he said. The launch was marred by tumultuous scenes on Tuesday when Israeli troops opened fire on a large crowd, killing at least one civilian and injuring dozens. The chaotic start to the operation has raised international pressure on Israel to get more food in and halt the fighting in Gaza. GHF says it has so far supplied about 1.8m meals and plans to open more sites in the coming weeks. Netanyahu has faced growing criticism from key international allies in recent days. The French president, Emmanuel Macron, said on Friday that abandoning war-torn Gaza to its fate and giving Israel a 'free pass' would kill the west's credibility with the rest of the world. 'If we abandon Gaza, if we consider there is a free pass for Israel, even if we do condemn the terrorist attacks, we will kill our credibility,' Macron told a top defence forum in Singapore, adding: 'And this is why we do reject double standard.' Israel responded by accusing the French president of undertaking a 'crusade against the Jewish state'. 'There is no humanitarian blockade. That is a blatant lie,' Israel's foreign ministry said in a statement, defending its efforts to allow in aid. 'But instead of applying pressure on the jihadist terrorists, Macron wants to reward them with a Palestinian state. No doubt its national day will be October 7.' Macron also said recognition of a Palestinian state with conditions was 'not only a moral duty, but a political necessity'. A 'hardened stance' would mean dropping an assumption that human rights were being respected 'and apply sanctions', the French leader said during his state visit to Singapore. Israeli jets continued to pound the Palestinian territory on Friday, killing at least 14 people in Jabaliya refugee camp, medics who received the bodies at al-Shifa hospital in northern Gaza said. The previous day, Israeli strikes killed another 45 people, including 23 in a strike on the Bureij camp in the central Gaza Strip, Palestinian medical workers said. Israel launched its campaign in Gaza in response to the devastating Hamas attack in southern Israel on 7 October 2023, which killed 1,200 people and took 251 hostages into Gaza, according to Israeli tallies. The campaign has killed more than 54,000 Palestinians, Gaza health officials say, and left the territory in ruins.
Washington Post
3 hours ago
- General
- Washington Post
Hamas says it is still reviewing a US proposal for a Gaza ceasefire
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — Hamas said Friday it was still reviewing a U.S. proposal for a temporary ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, where 27 people were killed in new Israeli airstrikes, according to hospital officials. The ceasefire plan, which has been approved by Israeli officials, won a cool initial reaction Thursday from the militant group.
Associated Press
3 hours ago
- General
- Associated Press
AP PHOTOS: Starving civilians caught in the chaos of food distribution in Gaza
The residents of the Gaza Strip are facing severe shortages of food in the besieged coastal region that has been in the middle of a grinding war for more than 600 days. As hunger grows, hundreds of Palestinians stormed a United Nations warehouse on Wednesday in search of food. A day earlier, a crowd was fired upon while overrunning an aid distribution site set up by a new foundation backed by Israel and the United States. In the chaos that followed the new food aid system in Gaza opening its first distribution hubs, Palestinians carrying bags of flour from the World Food Program warehouse in Zawaida, Central Gaza Strip, showed what they had managed to acquire. In Rafah, in southern Gaza Strip, Palestinians opened boxes containing food and humanitarian aid packages delivered by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a U.S.-backed organization approved by Israel. In Khan Younis, Israeli tanks were seen taking up positions next to an humanitarian aid packages distribution center. Palestinians carried an injured man after he was shot at the center run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. Until last week, Israel kept food and other supplies from entering Gaza for nearly three months as it pressures Hamas over their 19-month war. __ This is a photo gallery curated by AP photo editors.
