Starving Gazans scramble for food aid drops in city
On the ground, where almost no building within sight was still standing, hungry men and boys raced towards the beach where most of the aid seemed to have landed
GAZA CITY: A military plane banked over the war-ravaged ruins of Gaza City dropping dozens of black parachutes carrying food aid.
On the ground, where almost no building within sight was still standing, hungry men and boys raced towards the beach where most of the aid seemed to have landed.
Dozens of them jostled intensely to get to the food, with scrums forming up and down the rubble-strewn dunes.
“People are dying just to get a can of tuna,” said Mohamad Al Sabaawi, carrying an almost empty bag on his shoulder, a young boy beside him.
“The situation is tragic, as if we are in a famine. What can we do? They mock us by giving us a small can of tuna.”
Aid groups say only a fraction of the supplies required to meet basic humanitarian needs have arrived in Gaza since October, while the UN has warned of famine in the north of the territory by May without urgent intervention.
The aid entering the Gaza Strip by land is far below pre-war levels, at around 150 vehicles a day compared to at least 500 before the war, according to UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees.
With Gazans increasingly desperate, foreign governments have turned to airdrops, in particular in the hard-to-reach northern parts of the territory including Gaza City.
The United States, France and Jordan are among several countries conducting airdrops to people living within the ruins of what was the besieged territory’s biggest city.
But the aircrews themselves said that the drops were insufficient.
US Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Jeremy Anderson noted earlier this month that what they were able to deliver was only a “drop in the bucket” of what was needed.
The air operation has also been marred by deaths. Five people on the ground were killed by one drop and 10 others injured ater parachutes malfunctioned, according to a medic in Gaza.
Calls have mounted for Israel to allow in more aid overland, while Israel has blamed the UN and UNRWA for not distributing aid in Gaza.
“Palestinians in Gaza desperately need what has been promised - a flood of aid. Not trickles. Not drops,” UN chief Antonio Guterres said on Sunday ater visiting Gaza’s southern border crossing with Egypt at Rafah.
“Looking at Gaza, it almost appears that the four horsemen of war, famine, conquest and death are galloping across it,” he added.
Returning home in Gaza City with litle to keep his family going, another Palestinian man said their situation was miserable.
“We are the people of Gaza, waiting for aid drops, willing to die to get a can of beans - which we then share among 18 people,” he said.
Bilal Awad, a 63-year-old displaced Gazan, welcomed Monday the UN Security Council’s call for a ceasefire but did not believe it would bring a respite in the Israel-hamas war.
Without forceful action from “Israel’s supporter” Washington, which abstained in the vote to its close ally’s chagrin, the Israeli government is unlikely to budge, Awad said.
Monday’s resolution was the first Security Council demand for “an immediate ceasefire” since the war began, and was endorsed by 14 members - all but the United States.
It calls for a truce for the ongoing Muslim Holy month of Ramadan, and demands Palestinian must release the hostages seized during the Hamas atack, of whom Israel says around 130 remain in Gaza.
Yet Awad, who like the majority of Gaza’s 2.4 million people has sought refuge in the southern city of Rafah near the Egyptian border, wanted more.
“If Israel defies the world, this is a blow to America, Israel’s supporter. America’s decisions become mere ink on paper if it does not stop Israel by force.”
Rafah’s population has ballooned with the arrival of many Palestinians like Awad, displaced by nearly six months of war and seeking refuge in the south, unable to leave the besieged coastal strip.
The city is now home to around 1.5 million Palestinians, up from several hundred thousands before the war, with many living in makeshit displacement camps.