GAZA: The UN agency for Palestinian refugees has halted the delivery of aid through the key Kerem Shalom crossing between Israel and Gaza after it became “impossible,” its chief said Sunday.
“The road out of this crossing has not been safe for months. On 16 November, a large convoy of aid trucks was stolen by armed gangs,” UNRWA head Philippe Lazzarini posted on X.
“Yesterday, we tried to bring in a few food trucks on the same route. They were all taken,” he added, warning hunger was “rapidly deepening” in Gaza.
Lazzarini listed how the humanitarian operation had become “unnecessarily impossible” because of “the ongoing siege, hurdles from Israeli authorities, political decisions to restrict the amounts of aid, lack of safety on aid routes and targeting of local police.”
It comes after the United Nations warned Friday that Gaza has descended into anarchy, with hunger soaring, looting rampant and rising numbers of rapes in shelters as public order falls apart.
Israel, which imposed a total siege on the Hamas-ruled territory in the early stages of the war last year, blames the inability of relief organizations to handle and distribute large quantities of aid.
“Only 7 percent of the aid that came into the Gaza Strip in November was coordinated by UNRWA,” the Israeli defense ministry agency responsible for civilian affairs in the Palestinian territories, COGAT, said on X.
“There are dozens of humanitarian organizations operating in the Gaza Strip that continue to take a growing role in delivering humanitarian aid,” it added.
During a press visit Thursday, the Israeli army showed aid shipments at the crossing and said they wait at the Gaza side of Kerem Shalom for “months.”
Lazzarini also said Israel “must refrain from attacks on humanitarian workers.”
His demand follows an Israeli strike Saturday that killed three contractors of the US charity World Central Kitchen, including one who Israel’s military said was involved in Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack.
Save The Children later said a strike killed one of its staff members, the second employee to be killed since the war began last October.
The UN last month said 333 aid workers had been killed since the war began in October last year, 243 of them employees of UNRWA.
Lazzarini reiterated his call for a ceasefire “that would also secure the delivery of safe and uninterrupted aid to people in need.”
A summit of Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) leaders urged an “immediate and permanent cessation of Israeli fire and military operations” as well as “the delivery of all humanitarian and relief aid and basic needs to the residents of Gaza.”
German deputy foreign minister Tobias Linder also said Israel had no excuse for hampering aid delivery to Gaza before a conference in Cairo on the subject Monday.
Jean-Francois Corty, president of France-based charity Medecins du Monde, warned UNRWA’s decision was a “very bad omen” and “tragic in a context that was already so.”
Claire Nicolet, head of mission in Jerusalem for Doctors Without Borders, told AFP the situation was “already catastrophic” and that UNRWA’s announcement was the “straw that broke the camel’s back” because the UN agency was “the backbone of aid for the supply of food and equipment.”
The Hamas attack in October 2023 resulted in the deaths of 1,207 people in Israel, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.
At least 44,429 Palestinians, a majority of them civilians, have been killed in Israel’s military campaign in the Gaza Strip since the war began, according to data provided by the health ministry in the territory.
The UN has acknowledged these figures to be reliable.
UNRWA pauses aid delivery via key Gaza-Israel crossing
https://arab.news/54zs8
UNRWA pauses aid delivery via key Gaza-Israel crossing

- Delivery through Israeli-controlled Kerem Shalom crossing has been paused due to unsafe route and looting by armed gangs inside Gaza
Jordan-Syria coordination council will strengthen ties, King Abdullah says

- Nations’ leaders speak after deal signed to establish new body
- Ahmed Al-Sharaa praises Jordan’s support for Syria
LONDON: King Abdullah II of Jordan and Syrian Arab Republic interim President Ahmed Al-Sharaa spoke on Thursday about bilateral relations and regional developments.
The telephone conversation came after the two countries this week signed an agreement to establish the Higher Coordination Council, which aims to strengthen collaboration in key sectors such as water, energy and trade.
The king said the new body would institutionalize cooperation and maximize opportunities for both nations. He also reiterated his support for Syrians and the country’s security, stability and territorial integrity, the Jordan News Agency reported.
Al-Sharaa praised Jordan’s support for enhancing Syria’s international presence after both the EU and US this month announced the lifting of Assad-era sanctions on the country.
The two leaders also emphasized the need to increase efforts to stabilize southern Syria and improve border security.
Sweden to charge militant over Jordanian pilot burnt to death in Syria: prosecutor

- Prosecutors plan to charge the Swedish citizen with “serious war crimes and terrorist crimes in Syria“
STOCKHOLM: Prosecutors said Thursday they plan to indict a convicted Swedish militant for his suspected involvement in the 2014 capture of a Jordanian pilot in Syria and burning him to death in a cage.
Sweden’s Prosecution Authority said in a statement it planned to charge a 32-year-old Swedish citizen on May 27 with “serious war crimes and terrorist crimes in Syria.”
The man, Osama Krayem, has already been sentenced for his involvement in the 2015 attacks in Paris and the attacks in Brussels a year later.
Summer comes early for Iraq with 49 degrees Celsius in Basra

- In Iraq, summer temperatures often exceed 50 degrees Celsius, especially in July and August
BAGHDAD: Summer has come early for Iraq this year with temperatures hitting 49 degrees Celsius (topping 120 degrees Fahrenheit) in the southern city of Basra on Thursday, the national weather center said.
“It is the highest temperature recorded in Iraq this year,” weather center spokesperson Amer Al-Jabiri told AFP.
He said the early heat was in contrast to last year, when the temperature was “relatively good” in May and “it only began to rise in June.”
In Iraq, summer temperatures often exceed 50 degrees Celsius, especially in July and August, and sometimes reach these levels earlier.
On Sunday, two cadets died and others were admitted to hospital with heat stroke at a military academy in the southern province of Dhi Qar, authorities said.
The defense ministry said nine cadets “showed signs of fatigue and exhaustion due to sun exposure” while waiting to be assigned to battalions.
Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani ordered an investigation into the deaths of the two cadets.
Iraq is one of the five countries most impacted by some effects of climate change, according to the United Nations. It has also seen a prolonged drought and frequent dust storms.
Israel army issues evacuation warning for 14 areas of north Gaza

- The army told residents that it was operating with intense force
JERUSALEM: The Israeli army issued an evacuation warning on Thursday for 14 neighborhoods in the northern Gaza Strip, including parts of Beit Lahia and Jabalia.
The army told residents in an Arabic-language statement that it was “operating with intense force in your areas, as terrorist organizations continue their activities and operations” there.
A similar warning for parts of northern Gaza was issued on Wednesday evening in what the army said was a response to rocket fire.
It said that one “projectile that was identified crossing into Israel from the northern Gaza Strip was intercepted” by the air force.
It later announced three more launches from northern Gaza, but said the projectiles had fallen inside the Palestinian territory.
Israel has ramped up its Gaza operations in recent days in what it says is a renewed push to destroy Hamas.
The territory’s civil defense agency said Israeli attacks had killed at least 19 people on Thursday.
Turkiye’s Erdogan says Damascus must keep focused on Kurdish SDF deal

- Ankara views the SDF and its factions as a terrorist group
ANKARA: Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said Syria’s government must keep focused on its deal with the Kurdish, US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) under which it is to integrate into the Syrian armed forces, pressing Damascus for its implementation.
Speaking to reporters on a flight from Budapest, he said Turkiye, Syria, Iraq and the United States had a committee to discuss the fate of Daesh militants in prison camps in northeast Syria, which have been run by the SDF for years.
Ankara views the SDF and its factions as a terrorist group.
“We are especially following the YPG issue very, very closely. It is important for the Damascus administration not to take its attention away from this issue,” his office on Thursday cited him as saying. The YPG militia spearheads the SDF.
He added that Iraq should focus on the issue of the camps, as most women and children at the Al-Hol camp there were from Iraq and Syria, and that Iraq should repatriate its nationals.