UAE FACILITATES MARITIME AID TO AVERT GAZA FAMINE
▶ Minister of State promises more humanitarian deliveries after ship leaves Cyprus for enclave
A maritime corridor to bring desperately needed aid to northern Gaza is vital to “avert famine”, a UAE minister involved in the mission said.
Reem Al Hashimy, Minister of State for International Co-operation, said the alternative was to watch Palestinians starve to death in the enclave, where many face famine after more than five months of war.
“The operation is to avert famine in north Gaza … what can we do to bring in enough so we are not seeing people starve to death,” she told The National in a joint interview with the chief executive of non-governmental organisation World Central Kitchen, Erin Gore.
The UAE has partnered with World Central Kitchen to deliver 200 tonnes of food by ship from Cyprus to Gaza, in an operation with the US, EU, Cyprus and the Open Arms NGO. The first vessel operated by Open Arms was due to arrive in Gazan waters overnight on Thursday.
Ms Al Hashimy stressed that further aid deliveries will follow. “The first ship is not the only ship,” she said.
It is the first voyage along the maritime corridor. A second ship was being loaded with food aid for Gaza at the Cypriot port of Larnaca on Thursday. Ms Al Hashimy and Ms Gore were keen to highlight that the maritime aid mission should not be considered a replacement for aid entering by land.
The UAE has provided support to Palestinians since the start of the Israel-Gaza war in October through several avenues. These include flying thousands of injured and sick Gazans to the Emirates for treatment, dropping aid into Gaza from planes and setting up a field hospital in the enclave.
The sea operation is the first time the UAE has worked with World Central Kitchen.
Ms Al Hashimy said the organisation “has really raised the bar in delivering in crisis situations in general and this was an opportunity”.
It has already served more than 35 million meals in Gaza.
The UAE has joined forces with Washington-based NGO World Central Kitchen in an effort to avert a famine in Gaza by ensuring life-saving aid reaches the Palestinian people.
As part of that effort, the Emirates and WCK, launched by Spanish-American chef Jose Andres, are delivering aid through a maritime route in co-ordination with the US, EU and Cyprus.
The first ship, the Open Arms, set sail from Cyprus on Tuesday, carrying 200 tonnes of food.
“The operation is to avert famine in north Gaza … what can we do to bring in enough so we are not seeing people starve to death,” Reem Al Hashimy, Minister of State for International Co-operation, told The National.
Ms Al Hashimy and WCK chief executive Erin Gore both spoke of the absolute need to avoid a famine northern Gaza.
Ms Gore, who was in Abu Dhabi to co-ordinate efforts with the UAE, said: “I cannot sleep at night, knowing we are not trying. I believe the greatest failure is to do nothing at all.”
There is ample understanding that this mission alone is not sufficient, and both Ms Al Hashimy and Ms Gore stressed the need for all who can to get involved and send aid.
The UAE has not previously worked with WCK, but Ms Al Hashimy said the organisation “has really raised the bar in delivering in crisis situations in general, and this was an opportunity” to tackle the problem. The first meeting between the two sides only took place last month, and within days efforts had been made to make this a workable solution.
“We don’t want to do a big media stunt,” Ms Al Hashimy said. “This is really about helping people in the north … let’s just stay focused on how we’re going to help people in the north and not do something gimmicky.”
There were a lot of complexities to address to get the ship to Gaza, particularly ensuring the safety of aid workers and recipients, and getting Israeli approval. Organisers are being careful not to talk about how approval is obtained or the political manoeuvring needed to ensure the mission’s success.
Ms Gore said what brought had the UAE and WCK together was that “we are so focused on action … it takes courage and an openness to try new things to adapt, to fail, but learn from failure to improve every single day”.
WCK has been working in southern Gaza through a local aid distribution partner, Anera, having co-operated with them in past wars. However, Ms Gore said, “nothing has been at the level of the scale as to where we are now”.
The NGO works with local chefs and partners, she said. “We work with the community, we hire the community.”
Ms Al Hashimy and Ms Gore were keen to highlight that the maritime border should not be considered a substitute for opening Gaza’s land borders.
Ms Al Hashimy said: “The maritime corridor was designed for it to be a constant supply in, as an additive to all of the other necessary entry points, which we also support. We want to see all the other entry points also open up.
“So it doesn’t really replace anything … the needs right now are so great that you need all of them as much as you can, and as quickly as you can.”
Ms Gore explained: “I want us to build a highway of constantly flowing aid on the sea as just one more access point into Gaza that is so desperately needed.”
The UAE has made broad efforts to support Palestinians since the start of the war, including bringing thousands of sick and injured Gazans to the Emirates for treatment, dropping tonnes of aid into Gaza and setting up a field hospital in the enclave.
“We’re still going to be doing airdrops, even as we’re doing the maritime, even as land opens, until the needs are mitigated against,” Ms Al Hashimy said. She expects the need for aid to continue long after the war ends, and the UAE is committed to meeting that need while it exists.
WCK has served more than 35 million meals in Gaza, opened 60 community kitchens, and plans to open at least 10 more.
It has hired 400 Gazans, providing them with an income at a time when the local economy has imploded. “There are thousands volunteering,” Ms Gore said. “If you walk into a kitchen, you probably see five or six chefs, but maybe 80 community helpers, because it’s during disasters when you see the worst of humanity, but also the best of humanity comes out.”
Asked how the UAE’s aid helps WCK expand its work in Gaza, Ms Gore said: “I see it as an accelerator, as an escalator … it is a partnership in the truest of essence … we are a non-profit organisation and we are also not a political organisation … and so there are limitations for every NGO.”
Now that the NGO has joined forces with the UAE, Ms Gore voiced hope that there would soon be “thousands of tonnes of aid being delivered by ship”.
When asked what her message was to Palestinians, a visibly emotional Ms Al Hashimy said: “We are coming.”
“The first ship is not the only ship,” she stressed.
Ms Gore concurred: “The first ship arriving is just the beginning, the second ship is on its way … it is the beginning, it is part of something so much bigger, so much greater in ensuring continuous flow of aid into Gaza.”
Ms Al Hashimy said people should not see the Open Arms voyage as the pinnacle of the operation. “That one moment
It’s during disasters when you see the worst of humanity, but also the best of humanity comes out
ERIN GORE
Chief executive, World Central Kitchen
is not the [most important] moment, it is initially to make sure we are not dealing with famine at this point.
“Very soon it will be dealing with disease, trying to make sure you have more access to clean water. It will evolve.”
However, for the moment, the top priority is “to sustain life … people are dying of starvation, that cannot be”.
The Open Arms is towing a raft packed with food such as flour, rice and canned chicken. To prepare the 200 tonnes of ready-to-eat meals, WCK had to execute a “challenging and complex” mission that involved a logistics team experienced in purchasing massive quantities of food, Ms Gore said.
“That is not normal for World Central Kitchen, we thrive in making hot meals,” she explained. But right now, the focus is on ready-to-eat meals because “the situation is incredibly dire, and when people get food in their hands, they need the sustenance, they need the nutrition, they need the nourishment”.
The need for pre-prepared food stems from a lack of storage and cooking gas.
This has led WCK to look for innovative solutions to help people heat their meals, including the use of wooden pellets and solar-powered packs, working with a Cairo-based company.
Ms Al Hashimy said: “The success of this partnership is that you would have never expected it in its speed, not in its scale, not in its ability to come in a very dire situation, and yet it’s working.”
She added that it has been a “mission-driven approach” that relies on continuous co-ordination and communication.
As truce talks stalled, the hope was that the initial shipment of food aid would arrive in Gaza by the beginning of Ramadan on Monday. Nevertheless, it was “less about getting it done before Ramadan and more about getting it done”, emphasised Ms Al Hashimy.
“If Ramadan is about the absence of food, they’ve had no food for a while. If Ramadan is about the absence of family, many of them have lost their family. So if anything, maybe in Ramadan, it’s less about food coming to them and more about they’re not forgotten, that there is hope.”
The Pentagon this week sent military vessels from the US East Coast to the Mediterranean, where American troops will help to install a temporary pier and dock to deliver more aid into the Gaza Strip. However, the mini-port will not be up and running until early May.
Ms Al Hashimy said the UAE supports the plan, described the pier as “an important piece” and emphasised that “any entry point that is preapproved of goods that are to reduce the suffering of the people would be a very good thing”. The UAE is a leading provider of aid to conflict and disaster-stricken countries across the region and beyond, such as Yemen, Syria and Ukraine.
In this operation, Ms Gore described the UAE’s involvement as broad, including “logistical, a thought partnership, a brain trust that is coming together with the shared mission to get as much food to Gaza as possible”.
“What ships do we have? Who has a crane? Who has 100 tonnes of food? Where is it? How can we put your 100 tonnes of food on the same ship as World Central Kitchen?
“It truly is a brain meld, a mission meld, really focused on action, action, action.”
There has been an effort to find vessels capable of making deliveries, she said, which has meant joining forces with others for quick action.
Ms Al Hashimy also stressed the need for agility and quick action. “Sometimes smaller groups can move faster than larger institutions that are heavy on bureaucracy … solutions exist in places of imagination.
“It is always hard but there are ways around it … we wanted the same thing, to reduce human suffering and to reduce it as quickly as possible.”
Ms Gore added: “It’s nonstop, it’s all day. It’s every day and that is the urgency of the situation and decisions are made quickly.”
For Ms Al Hashimy, who has been involved in many aid projects, this is the hardest mission of all. She explained: “This is a different universe in terms of the scale of complexity and danger, the difficulty of access, and the dire situation.
“And this is all happening while you also have negotiations on hostage release and ceasefire. So it’s almost the worst time for us to try to do something, but also the only time.
“This is the hardest thing I’ve ever seen really. And also the most painful that I’ve ever seen in my life. And I don’t know if it makes me more prepared for anything else. But it’s definitely one that I know has changed me as well.”