GAZA STRIP: Local authorities reported on Tuesday that twelve people had drowned and at least six had died in stampedes while attempting to get aid that had been airdropped into Gaza.
The killings happened on Monday in the northern part of the beleaguered enclave, when Palestinians raced to pick up parcels that had been dropped by planes along the Mediterranean shore of Gaza.
The UN humanitarian office demanded on Tuesday that Israel lift the prohibition on food supplies from the UN Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA to the northern Gaza region, citing the "cruel death by famine" that the people there were facing.
Earlier, Israel declared it will no longer cooperate with UNRWA in Gaza, charging the humanitarian organization with escalating hostilities. Israel allegedly informed the agency that it would no longer permit its food convoys to the northern part of Gaza.
UN spokesman Jens Laerke of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) stated during a UN briefing in Geneva, "The decision must be revoked." "You cannot say that you uphold these international legal provisions by impeding UNRWA food convoys."
According to a UN-backed assessment this month, starvation in northern Gaza is expected to break out by May.
James Elder, a spokesman for Unicef, a UN agency for children in Gaza, reported witnessing underweight babies from malnourished mothers in incubators and "paper thin" toddlers in a northern Gazan hospital.
During the same briefing, he described his most recent trip to the north on Monday, saying, "Tens of thousands of people crowd the streets." They give out the common signal, reaching from mouth to mouth in a desperate attempt to get food.
"Help that could save lives is being blocked. People are losing their lives. I saw skeletal children in such extreme malnutrition," he remarked.
While UNRWA is the main donor, other relief organizations also transport food packages to the northern part of Gaza.
defending the Palestinians
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin stated on Tuesday in Washington that the humanitarian crisis in the beleaguered enclave was becoming worse and that protecting Palestinian civilians in Gaza was both strategically and morally necessary.
As tensions between US President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reached a wartime low, he was speaking at the beginning of a meeting with Israel Defense Minister Yoav Gallant at the Pentagon.
"Humanitarian aid is currently provided in far too little quantity and the number of civilian casualties in Gaza is far too high," Austin stated.
Austin stated, "Gaza is experiencing a humanitarian catastrophe and the situation is getting even worse," speaking about the problem with more vigor than he had in the past.
He continued by saying that he and Gallant will talk about ways to lessen Gaza's humanitarian predicament.
Combat rages on
With Israeli operations taking place in and near at least three major hospitals in the beleaguered enclave, the combat continued unabatedly on the ground in Gaza.
The Israeli military stated that during the course of the previous day, its jets had targeted over 60 targets in Gaza, including what it purported to be military buildings, infrastructure, and tunnels.
According to the health ministry in Gaza, 70 individuals died early on Tuesday, 13 of them as a result of Israeli airstrikes near the southern city of Rafah.
Witnesses reported that hundreds of Israeli tanks and armored vehicles surrounded the Nasser Hospital, which is located in the southern city of Khan Yunis and has become a haven for thousands of displaced Palestinians.
The vast compound was the scene of gunfire, according to the health ministry, but no raid had occurred as of yet.
Israeli forces have been engaged in intense warfare at the largest hospital in the area, Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, for the past nine days. Israel says it has captured hundreds of Palestinian militants and killed 170 of them.
Doha held "dead end" negotiations.
A senior Israeli official told Reuters on Tuesday that Israel has withdrawn its negotiators from Doha because it considered the mediation negotiations on a Gaza truce to be "at a dead end" because of demands made by Hamas.
Yahya Sinwar, the leader of Hamas, was charged by the official with undermining diplomatic efforts “as part of a wider effort to inflame this war over Ramazan”.
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