In the most recent news concerning the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, with the continued war in Gaza, Egypt has sent 20 aid trucks to Gaza, through Rafah border.
It's been two weeks since Hamas attacked Israelis - killing 3,785 Palestinians, leaving 12,500 wounded, and 1,400 Israelis dead (PBS, 2023). This was following Israel’s oppression of Palestine. According to Amnesty, “Israeli forces launched a three-day offensive on the occupied Gaza Strip in August during which they committed apparent war crimes. This compounded the impact of a 15-year ongoing Israeli blockade that amounts to illegal collective punishment and further fragments Palestinian territory.”
Since then, Israel declared war on Hamas, but this only seems to be, from both sides, at the expense of civilians in the Gaza strip. Since the Hamas attack, the Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, stated in a video, spoken in Hebrew, that Israel plans “an extensive mobilization of IDF [Israeli Defence Force] reserves to fight back on a scale and intensity that the enemy has so far not experienced” (Lords of Parliament Library, 2023).
Now, over 3,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israel’s attacks on Gaza since the Hamas attack on 7 October (Al Jazeera, 2023). As of Saturday, 21 October, Israel has bombed Al-Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza City, which has killed more than 500 Palestinians. This has been reported to be one of the most deadly attacks on a hospital in decades. Israeli military have since reported, claiming it was a misfired Palestinian Islamic Jihad rocket (Al Jazeera, 2023).
This strike has caused protests at Israeli embassies in UK and Australia, with more than 100,000 people showing up to a pro-Palestine rally in London on Saturday, 21 October, at 2pm (The Guardian, 2023).
US president Joe Biden and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met recently to discuss the conflict in a 31-hour visit to Israel. Biden announced sending $100 million to aid Palestinans, and to argue the protection of innocent Palestinians, persuading Israel to allow aid to be let into Gaza. Following his visit, Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah El-Sissi was able to send 20 aid trucks into southern Gaza (NPR, 2023).
With aid not being allowed into Gaza, Palestinians amidst the war and terror are facing a humanitarian crisis. The trucks were full of food, water, medicines, and fuel for the civilians. However, there is a population of 2.3 million in Gaza, so there will be much more needed to keep the people of Gaza safe and healthy. This could prove an issue as verification procedure is still under discussion as the Israeli government is wary of any aid supplies being usurped by Hamas (The Guardian, 2023).
UN secretary general António Guterres, stated at a peace summit in Cairo that: “The people of Gaza need a commitment for much, much more – a continuous delivery of aid to Gaza at the scale that is needed” (The Guardian, 2023).
Edited by: Anwen Venn
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