LARNACA, Cyprus (AP) – The president of the European Commission said Friday that a ship carrying humanitarian aid was preparing to leave Cyprus for Gaza, as international donors said Friday that a ship carrying humanitarian aid was preparing to leave Cyprus for Gaza. It announced the opening of a sea corridor to supply food to areas facing siege. war.
The opening of the corridor, along with the recent start of airlift aid, signaled growing frustration with Gaza’s humanitarian crisis and a new international willingness to circumvent Israeli restrictions.
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Ursula von der Leyen told reporters in Cyprus that she inspected the preparations for a ship belonging to the Spanish aid group Open Arms, which will conduct a test voyage to test the corridor in the coming days. He said he was doing it. The ship is in the port of Larnaca, Cyprus, awaiting approval for food aid from World Central Kitchen, an American charity founded by celebrity chef Jose Andrés.
Israel said Friday it welcomed the maritime corridor. However, he warned that security checks would also be required.
In this photo provided by the French military, a soldier gestures before airdropping supplies into the Gaza Strip on January 4, 2024. On Friday, March 8, 2024, a senior European Union official visits Cyprus to inspect preparations for sending supplies. Aid by sea to war-torn Gaza was desperately needed, and President Joe Biden announced that the U.S. military would establish a temporary port off Gaza’s Mediterranean coast to support such efforts. It was only a few hours since then.
“The Cypriot initiative will allow for the expansion of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip, subject to security checks in accordance with Israeli standards,” said Israeli Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Lior Hyat (ex-Twitter). mentioned in.
In response to the “humanitarian catastrophe” unfolding in Gaza, von der Leyen said at a press conference with Cypriot President Nicos Christodoulides that the European Union has joined forces with the United States, the United Arab Emirates and other interested countries. He also stated that they are starting to open sea routes.
“The humanitarian situation in Gaza is dire, leaving innocent Palestinian families and children desperate for basic needs,” she said.
Open Arms founder Oscar Camps told The Associated Press that the ship is scheduled to leave port on Saturday and will arrive at an undisclosed location where the organization World Central Kitchen is building a pier to receive it. He said it would take two to three days. The group says it has set up 60 soup kitchens across Gaza to distribute aid.
The ship will tow a barge loaded with 200 tons of rice and flour to near the Gaza coast. A pontoon boat is then used for the complex final leg of towing the barge to the pier.
Camps said his group had been planning the delivery for two months, long before the European Commission president declared the safety corridor open. He said he was more concerned about “the safety and lives of the people in Gaza” than the ship’s safety.
Camps said: “We don’t know if each country is planning something bigger, but we are doing the best we can with the organization’s budget of 3 million euros, which is made up of private donations.” said.
In Brussels, commission spokesman Balazs Ujvari said the Open Arms ship’s direct route to Gaza poses a number of “logistical problems” that are still being resolved. He said United Nations agencies and the Red Cross would also play a role.
Efforts have begun to establish a sea route for aid deliveries as fears grow of widespread hunger among the Gaza Strip’s 2.3 million residents. Hunger is worst in northern Gaza, which has been isolated by Israeli forces for months and has suffered long-term food supply disruptions.
On Thursday, President Joe Biden announced plans to build a temporary pier to deliver aid to Gaza, adding that the United States, a key Middle East ally, will use military aid to deliver aid to Gaza. He emphasized how Israel, the largest recipient of the virus, must be bypassed. Including the airdrop that started last week. Israel has accused Hamas of looting some aid.
Aid workers say it is far more costly and inefficient to deliver large quantities of needed aid to people by sea or air than by truck overland. Five people were killed and several others injured when an airdrop malfunctioned in the Gaza Strip on Friday, hitting a person and landing on a house, Palestinian officials said.
After months of warnings of the risk of starvation in Gaza under Israeli shelling, offensives and siege, hospital doctors have reported 20 deaths related to malnutrition at two hospitals in northern Gaza.
While reiterating his support for Israel, Biden again called on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in his State of the Union address to approve more aid to Gaza.
“To the leaders of Israel, I say this: Humanitarian assistance must not be a secondary consideration or a bargaining chip,” Biden declared in Congress. He also reiterated his call for Israel to do more to protect civilians during fighting and to work towards the establishment of a Palestinian state as the only long-term solution to Israeli-Palestinian violence.
U.S. officials said it would likely be several weeks before the Gaza jetty was operational.
Aid groups said efforts to deliver badly needed supplies to Gaza were hampered by difficulties coordinating with Israeli forces, ongoing hostilities and a breakdown in security. Getting aid to the isolated north is even more difficult.
Sigrid Kaag, the UN’s senior humanitarian and reconstruction coordinator for Gaza, told reporters late Thursday that air and sea transport cannot make up for the lack of land supply routes.
Ms von der Leyen said the EU would continue to explore different ways to obtain aid to Gaza. “If our humanitarian partners on the ground believe this is effective, we will consider all other options, including airdrops,” he said.
Meanwhile, efforts to reach a ceasefire before Ramadan appear to have stalled. Hamas announced Thursday that its delegation had left Cairo, where talks are ongoing until next week.
International mediators hope a six-week ceasefire will ease some of the looming crisis, allowing Hamas to release some of the Israeli hostages it is holding and allowing Israel to free Palestinians. Some prisoners will be released and aid groups will be given access to aid operations. Massive aid influx into Gaza.
Palestinian militants believe they are holding about 100 hostages and the bodies of 30 others in an October 7 Hamas attack that killed about 1,200 people and took about 250 hostages in Israel. It is being Dozens of hostages were freed during a week-long ceasefire in November, and around 30 people are believed to have been killed.
The Gaza Health Ministry said at least 30,878 Palestinians had been killed. The tally does not distinguish between civilians and combatants, but it says two-thirds of the dead were women and children. The ministry, which is part of the Hamas-run government, keeps detailed records and estimates of casualties from past wars are broadly consistent with those published by the United Nations and independent experts.
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Egyptian officials say Hamas has agreed to the main terms of such a deal as a first step, but wants commitments that could ultimately lead to a more permanent ceasefire, while Israel is pushing for more limited negotiations. We would like to limit this to limited agreements.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media about the negotiations. Both officials said mediators were still pressuring both parties to soften their positions.
