Food aid reaches north Gaza for first time in weeks

RAFAH, Gaza Strip — Aid convoys carrying food reached northern Gaza this week, Israeli officials said Wednesday, the first major delivery in a month.

The increasing alarm over hunger across Gaza has fueled international calls for a cease-fire as the U.S., Egypt and Qatar work to secure a deal between Israel and Hamas for a pause in fighting and the release of some of the hostages seized by Hamas terrorists in its Oct. 7 attack.

Mediators hope to reach an agreement before the Muslim holy month of Ramadan starts around March 10. But so far, Israel and Hamas have remained far apart in public on their demands.

Increasing the pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to reach a deal, families of hostages on Wednesday launched a four-day march from southern Israel to Jerusalem to demand their loved ones be set free. Some of the around 100 hostages freed during a cease-fire in late November are joining the march, which is to end near Netanyahu’s official residence.

The plight of the hostages has deeply shaken Israelis. In its Oct. 7 attack, Hamas terrorists killed some 1,200 people, mainly civilians, and abducted roughly 250 people, including men, women, children and older adults. After the November releases, some 130 hostages remain, and Israel says about a quarter of them are dead.

Israel’s response in Gaza to the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attack in southern Isrsael, which it says aims at destroying Hamas, has killed 29,954 Palestinians, according to the Hamas-run Health Ministry in Gaza. The ministry doesn’t differentiate between civilians and combatants.

Israel says it has killed 10,000 terrorists.

U.N. officials warn of further mass casualties if Israel follows through on vows to attack the southernmost city of Rafah in Gaza.

A convoy of 31 trucks carrying food entered northern Gaza on Wednesday, the Israeli military office that oversees Palestinian civilian affairs said. The office, known by the acronym COGAT, said nearly 20 other trucks entered the north on Monday and Tuesday. Associated Press footage showed people carrying sacks of flour from the distribution site.

It was not immediately clear who carried out the deliveries. The U.N. was not involved, said a spokesperson for the U.N.’s humanitarian coordination office, Eri Keneko.

COGAT said Wednesday that Israel does not impose limits on the amount of aid entering. Israel has blamed U.N. agencies for the bottleneck, saying hundreds of trucks are waiting on the Palestinian side of Kerem Shalom for aid workers to collect them.

U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric on Wednesday countered saying large trucks entering Gaza have to be unloaded and reloaded onto smaller Palestinian trucks, but there aren’t enough of them and there’s a lack of security to distribute aid in Gaza. Police in Gaza stopped protecting convoys after Israeli strikes on them near the crossing. There is also “insufficient coordination” from Israel on security and deconfliction, Dujarric said.

“That’s why we’ve repeatedly asked for a humanitarian cease-fire,” he said. The U.N. has called for Israel to open crossings in the north to aid deliveries and guarantee safe corridors for convoys.