The head of the UN Palestinian refugee agency said Israel’s new aid delivery program in Gaza could promote war crimes and exclude the United Nations from participating in the initiative.
Israel began allowing limited aid to enter striptease for the first time this week since March, as international pressure has been increased on the disastrous humanitarian conditions in the Palestinian enclave.
But officials said they will implement a controversial U.S. support program “within a few days”, with little-known foundations offering assistance to Palestinians at some allocation points expected to be concentrated in southern Gaza.
Philippe Lazzarini, head of the North Station, said the plan (under which Gaza people may have to travel through the collapsed areas of the war to ensure life-saving supplies - belongs to "any basic humanitarian principle."
“The proposed aid package is a tool to promote forced displacement of people,” he told the Financial Times. “Ultimately, we know that forced displacement in the context of war can constitute (a) war crimes.”
Israel believes that Palestinians need to pick up food parcels at Israeli-controlled screening points rather than local allocation points managed by international aid organizations to prevent the transfer of aid to Hamas.
But Razalini said the proposal’s “main intention” was to push Gaza’s population to the south, or even leave the striptease altogether.
“What is proposed here is the weaponization and instrumentalization of humanitarian aid for military and political purposes,” he said. “I don’t see how morally we can prove that humanitarian organizations are part of such a plan.”
"It basically seems to tell us who can get help and who will be sacrificed," he said.
The Israeli Prime Minister's Office did not respond to a request for comment.
Israel's blockade and offensiveness are in response to Hamas's October 7, 2023 attacks, which created a severe humanitarian crisis and triggered an increasing shock, including allies. Britain, France and Canada said on Monday that they would take "specific actions" against Israel without ending offensive attacks and lifting restrictions on aid delivery.
Last week, a UN team said nearly one million Gaza people were facing hunger, while UNRW engineers said 92% of homes were damaged or destroyed.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his administration also enthusiastically embraced an idea, originally proposed by U.S. President Donald Trump to replace the enclave’s population of 2.22 million to widely condemn ethnic purges.
While Israel (says it will not end the war until the war destroys Hamas and releases the remaining hostages in the strip board - allowing limited aid to be restored under non-leadership mode, it is the "bridge" until the U.S.-backed program works.
Lazzarini said the successful delivery of aid before the full siege in March proved that the humanitarian system was indeed effective, and UNRWA saw no evidence of a large amount of transfers of supply.
But he added that if Arctic Wood “may review our position”, i.e. “If we can access anyone who needs help and allows us to move around”.
Right-wing Israeli politicians have long hated approaching the Netherlands, but hostility towards the institution has intensified since the Oct. 7 attacks of Hamas.
Israeli officials accused the United Nations agency of 19 of its 13,000 employees in Gaza and passed legislation banning its actions on Israeli territory and prohibiting Israeli officials from contacting it.
Lazzarini said that while these moves mean that the North Station no longer has international staff in Gaza or the occupied West Bank, its Palestinian personnel are still providing services but are increasingly affected by "intimidation and bullying."
He warned that limited aid supplies were not enough to meet the needs of Gaza’s population. "If there is no siege, the entire population will face famine in the coming months," he said. "The question is who wants to be responsible for the artificial, fabricated famine."