The Israeli finance ministry has blocked deliveries of meals for Gaza as a result of the shipments had been meant to succeed in the primary U.N. company for Palestinians, Israel’s finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, mentioned on Tuesday.
Mr. Smotrich, a hard-right settler chief, mentioned in a press release that he had issued a directive to not switch flour shipments to the company, generally known as UNRWA, citing allegations that a few of its workers had been affiliated with Hamas, together with 12 accused of taking part within the armed group’s Oct. 7 assault on Israel.
Last week, a subcontractor dealing with the shipments for UNRWA acquired a name from Israel’s customs company — which is housed in Mr. Smotrich’s ministry — ordering it to not course of any UNRWA items in its warehouse, mentioned Juliette Touma, an UNRWA spokeswoman.
About 1,050 containers — a lot of it flour — have been held up on the Israeli port of Ashdod, Philippe Lazzarini, the top of UNRWA, informed reporters on Friday. The quantity was sufficient to feed 1.1 million Gazans for a month, he mentioned. Mr. Lazzarini mentioned UNRWA nonetheless has sufficient provides to feed Gazans for 3 months, however solely as a result of the meals is now being routed via Egypt somewhat than Israel.
Israel’s motion as soon as once more put it at odds with the Biden administration, which has criticized the Israeli conduct of the warfare in more and more blunt phrases. “That flour has not moved the way that we had expected it would move, and we expect that Israel will follow through on its commitment to get that flour into Gaza,” Jake Sullivan, president Biden’s nationwide safety adviser, informed reporters on the White House on Wednesday.
Mr. Smotrich mentioned one other help distribution mechanism can be discovered “that would not reach Hamas,” which he mentioned was using UNRWA as a “key part of its war machine.” UNRWA has mentioned it’s investigating the allegations, however has stood by its work as important humanitarian aid in a posh scenario.
