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Gaza: As aid trucks enter, videos of Israeli hostages and attack on Red Crescent staffers spark outrage

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Meanwhile, on Thursday and again on Saturday, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hamas militants published disturbing videos of two emaciated Israeli hostages, sparking worldwide outrage and condemnation from UN leaders, including Secretary-General António Guterres on Monday.

The hostages pictured, Rom Braslavsk and Evyatar David, are two of the 49 are still being held in Gaza, including 27 the Israeli military says are dead.

At Monday’s daily briefing in New York, UN Deputy Spokesman Farhan Haq said the Secretary-General “was very shocked by this unacceptable violation of human dignity.”

UN rights chief Volker Türk added in a statement that he was appalled by the humiliating treatment of the hostages. Both he and the Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, Tom Fletcher, reiterated their call for an unconditional, immediate release of all hostages still being held since the 7 October terror attacks.

The High Commissioner said the “intolerable” sight of starvation in Gaza served as another reminder that the violence had to end. “Saving lives must be everyone’s priority.”

He called for Israel to immediately allow and facilitate rapid and unimpeded aid: “Denying civilians access to food may amount to a war crime, as well as potentially a crime against humanity.”

Attack on aid workers

On Sunday, the Israeli military reportedly struck the headquarters of the Palestinian Red Crescent Society in Khan Younis, killing one and injuring three other staff members.  

The facility is marked with the Red Crescent emblem and is thus protected under international humanitarian law.

The UN rights office (OHCHR) in Palestine expressed deep shock and outrage over these killings.

“These workers continue to engage in life-saving efforts putting their own lives at risk,” OHCHR said.

Aid entry  

Amid these controversies, the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, posted on social media on Saturday, saying that since Friday, the agency had brought 24 trucks with medical supplies into Gaza.  

Items included essential medicines, trauma and surgery supplies, treatments for non-communicable disease and laboratory and water testing supplies.  

Mr. Haq also highlighted on Monday that in recent days, the UN and its partners have collected wheat flour, ready-to-eat rations and hot meals from crossing points into Gaza, but most of the cargo was taken by the hungry and desperate before reaching intended destinations.

Additionally, hygiene kits and nutrition supplies, including high-energy biscuits for pregnant and breastfeeding women and infant formula, have entered in the past week.

However, in the second week since the Israeli announcement of tactical pauses to allow safe passages for UN aid convoys, Mr. Haq said realities on the ground remain largely the same.  

This includes many challenges to delivering aid, resulting in the impediment of two of the 11 missions on Sunday and the full passage of only seven.

Famine-like conditions

This aid is still a fraction of what is needed, as a catastrophic food crisis worsens across the Strip.  

The World Food Programme (WFP) said it “is doing everything possible to distribute vital food assistance to families,” but reported on Sunday that over half a million people in Gaza are enduring famine-like conditions.  

The UN aid agency for Palestinians (UNRWA) released an audio of Manar, an employee who works within Gaza, on Monday. She said that “food is never enough,” and that many walk in the heat for hours to search for food and medical supplies.

The Commissioner-General for UNRWA, Philippe Lazzarini, underscored that this near-famine is largely due to deliberate efforts to dismantle the UN-coordinated humanitarian system through the Israeli and US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which is responsible for the killing of nearly 1,400 starving Palestinians near its sites and convoy routes, according to Gaza’s health ministry.

Prioritising the GHF, Israel has prevented UNRWA – “the backbone of humanitarian response” – from bringing in assistance since 2 March, he said. 

Gaza: Aid trucks still waiting for Israeli green light inside enclave

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Existing supplies of basic necessities have been running dangerously low and on Wednesday the UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF, said that its nutrition stocks to prevent increasing malnutrition “are almost gone”.

“Humanitarian assistance is being weaponised to serve and support political and military objectives,” said Philippe Lazzarini, head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA.

Speaking at the European Humanitarian Forum, Mr. Lazzarini insisted that significant stocks of aid remain blocked at the enclave’s borders.

“UNRWA is a lifeline for people in face of immense needs,” he said, noting that the whole humanitarian community in Gaza remains ready to scale up the delivery of critical supplies and services.

The development comes a day after UN humanitarians said that they had been allowed to send “around 100” more aid trucks loaded with supplies into Gaza.

Too little, too late

While such a move would be welcome in light of the desperate humanitarian emergency created by Israel’s total blockade, relief teams have pointed out that this would be a fraction of the 500 trucks that entered the enclave every day before the war erupted in Gaza in October 2023.

Today, one in five Gazans faces starvation, according to respected food security experts from the UN-backed Integrated Food Security Phase Classification platform – or IPC.

UN agencies have repeatedly stressed that they have stockpiles of relief supplies ready to enter Gaza.

Economic ‘paralysis’

Inside Gaza, the daily struggle to find food and water continues because of the Israeli blockade of all commercial and humanitarian access.

According to the UN World Food Programme (WFP), markets are “severely paralyzed”, supply chains have collapsed and prices have spiked.

“The population is now facing extreme levels of poor dietary diversity, with most people unable to access even the most basic food groups,” the UN agency warned in its latest update on Gaza.

“Several essential food items, including eggs and frozen meat, have disappeared from the market,” it said. “Wheat flour has reached exorbitant prices, with increases of over 3,000 per cent compared to pre-conflict levels and more than 4,000 per cent” compared to the ceasefire period from January to March.

While the Gazan economy is now in “near-total paralysis”, the West Bank is also staring down a deep recession, with combined overall output shrunk by 27 per cent.

Given that this is the deepest contraction in the Occupied Palestinian Territory in over a generation, WFP cited projections that Gaza will require 13 years to recover to pre-crisis levels and the West Bank three years.

West Bank demolitions crisis

In the occupied West Bank, meanwhile, further demolitions of Palestinian buildings were reported on Monday and Tuesday, in Beit Sahur, Shu’fat and Nahhalin.

Since the start of the year, Israeli settlers have damaged water infrastructure in the West Bank more than 60 times, according to OCHA. It noted that herding communities have been impacted most severely.

More to come…

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