Calls for more aid grow in southern Gaza
The southern Gaza Strip came under intense Israeli bombardment overnight, despite international pressure for an immediate ceasefire.
Besieged Gaza is in desperate need of aid and the United States said it would continue airdrops, despite pleas from Palestinian groups to stop the practice after they said 18 people had died trying to reach food packages.
A fireball lit up the night sky in the southern city of Rafah, the last remaining urban centre in Gaza not to have been attacked by Israeli ground forces.
The Palestinian Red Crescent has warned that thousands were trapped in the Nasser hospital in Khan Younis and “their lives are in danger”.
Underscoring the desperation of civilians trapped by the fighting, Palestinians has asked donor countries to stop their airdrops after 12 people drowned trying to recover parachuted food aid from the sea off Gaza’s Mediterranean coast. The Swiss-based Euro-med Human Rights Monitor also said another six people were killed in stampedes trying to get aid.
“People are dying just to get a can of tuna,” Gaza resident Mohammad al Sabaawi said, holding a can in his hand after a scramble over an aid package.
The war has shattered Gaza’s infrastructure and aid agencies say all of its 2.4 million people are now in need of humanitarian help.
The UN children’s fund, Unicef, said vastly more aid must be rushed into Gaza by road rather than by air or sea to avert an “imminent famine”.
Unicef spokesman James Elder said the necessary help was “a matter of kilometres away” in aidfilled trucks waiting across Gaza’s southern border with Egypt.
The US National Security Council said in a statement it would continue trying to get aid in by road, but also said it would continue airdrops. AFPTV footage showed crowds rushing towards aid packages on Tuesday being dropped by parachute from planes sent by Jordan, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Germany.
Israel’s retaliatory campaign has killed at least 32,414 people in Gaza, most of them women and children, according to the health ministry.
Officials from the two warring sides are in indirect mediated talks in Qatar aimed at agreeing on a ceasefire and the release of captives.