The United Nations and other aid workers warned Saturday that a new UN Security Council resolution calling for increased aid for civilians in Gaza will fail to stem the spiraling humanitarian crisis because it does not require the complete cessation of hostilities.
The resolution called on the UN Secretary General to appoint a special coordinator for aid in Gaza and establish a mechanism to expedite the delivery of aid in consultation with all relevant parties.
But without a ceasefire to accompany the boosted aid, aid officials say they will not be able to address insufficient food and fuel entering the territory, the collapse of Gaza’s commercial sector, frequent disruptions of commissions or the inability of relief workers to reach many areas due to intensive Israeli airstrikes and ground operations.
“Right now, we cannot deploy humanitarian aid. Impossible,” said Guillemette Thomas, the medical coordinator for Doctors Without Borders in Jerusalem, adding that the shutdown of communication networks has forced it to rely on satellite phones to coordinate food distribution. “People need to be able to get food and water without fear of being bombed or killed or shot at any time. We need to be able to move within the strip to access people,” she added.
“The only thing that would help is a ceasefire.”
It is unclear whether the resolution will push Israel, which is not on the Security Council and thus has no vote, to change its approach to the war. Although such resolutions are considered binding, countries often ignore them.
The resolution referred to a proposal passed last month that called for “humanitarian pauses” and called for the “immediate and unconditional release of all hostages,” a demand that Hamas, which still holds approx. 120 Israelis, are unlikely to listen, hoping instead to exchange them. for Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.
Israeli leaders have vowed to continue fighting until Hamas is destroyed and insist on inspecting all goods bound for Gaza to prevent the entry of weapons and other supplies that could benefit Hamas’ military effort.
After 11 weeks of war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, international alarm has risen over the plight of more than 2 million people in the territory, increasingly cut off from the outside world, displaced, cold and hungry. About 85 percent of Gaza’s citizens have fled their homes, and fierce Israeli bombardment has killed more than 20,000 people, about 70 percent of them women and children, according to health authorities. in Gaza.
This week, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, an international collaboration of aid organizations, classified the entire population of Gaza as being in crisis or worse in terms of access to food. It noted that this was the “highest share of people facing high levels of severe food insecurity” that the partnership had seen for any given area in nearly two decades of monitoring.
Human Rights Watch this week accused the Israeli government to “use the starvation of civilians as a means of warfare,” which it called “a war crime.”
The Security Council resolution passed on Friday was carefully negotiated to avoid objections from the United States, which vetoed a December resolution calling for a cease-fire. The United States has said at the time that it supported Israel’s position that a halt to the offensive would allow Hamas to rearm and continue to pose a threat to Israel.
The new resolution, passed after repeated delays with a vote of 13-0, in which the United States and Russia abstained, focused on delivering aid, not stopping the fighting.
It called on the warring parties to “allow, facilitate and enable the immediate, safe and unimpeded delivery of humanitarian assistance” to civilians in Gaza and “create the conditions for a sustainable cessation of hostilities.”
It is unclear how long the special coordinator for aid in Gaza will be assigned and how fruitful their efforts will be. The resolution also did not immediately remove any of the snarls that limited the amount of aid entering Gaza, including a strict search regime by Israeli authorities, who say they want to prevent the entry of any goods that could benefit the Hamas
“The resolution maintains Israel’s security authority to monitor and inspect aid entering Gaza,” Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, Gilad Erdan, said after the vote.
Juliette Touma, the director of communications for UNRWA, the largest UN agency in Gaza, said it may be too early to know the full impact of the resolution.
“Welcome, but only time will tell what real difference this resolution will make, and it needs to increase humanitarian aid going to Gaza.”
The war began after a Hamas-led attack in southern Israel on October 7, which killed around 1,200 people and saw 240 others taken back to Gaza as hostages, according to Israeli officials. Since then, Gaza has been under Israeli siege, with very limited, and grossly inadequate amounts of aid entering Gaza’s border with Egypt.
Last week, after significant international pressure, Israel opened its main cargo crossing to Gaza and began bringing in aid. That crossing, Kerem Shalom, is open for the first time this war after Israel’s cabinet voted on Dec. 15 to approve temporarily allowing food and other humanitarian aid through.
With the direct crossings from Israel to Gaza closed, aid trucks were forced to travel from Egypt to Kerem Shalom for inspection by the Israeli military, and then return to Egypt and enter Gaza from there, exacerbating and complicating in the process.
The opening of Kerem Shalom was called as part of the recent hostage deal with Hamas, and Israel is also under intense pressure from United States officials to provide trucks that pass through it. If he continues to cross, it may provide some relief, but cabinet approval for its use is temporary.
said Ms. Touma said the aid coming into Gaza during the war was insufficient, less than 10 percent of what Gaza received before the war. And the fighting has made it impossible to distribute even limited aid to many parts of Gaza.
“The ongoing military operation and the bombing is definitely a challenge because you cannot deliver humanitarian aid under a sky full of airstrikes, and very little aid is coming in,” said Ms. Touma.
The small amount of aid coming into Gaza and the complete collapse of the territory’s commercial sector means that many families have exhausted their resources and are increasingly hungry, according to aid groups and Gaza residents.
Isabel Kershner contributed reporting.
