The US conducted its second airdrop of food over Gaza on Tuesday, as its officials continued to hammer Israel over hunger in the enclave and US President Joe Biden said he was doing everything possible to help Palestinians there.
“The United States is committed to pulling out every stop to get more aid to those in Gaza who desperately need it,” Biden said in a post on X. “We won’t stand by. We won’t let up.”
The United States is committed to pulling out every stop to get more aid to those in Gaza who desperately need it.We won’t stand by.We won’t let up.
— President Biden (@POTUS) March 5, 2024
For the third day in a row, US officials publicly chastised Israel for failing to put in place a distribution system in Gaza that would allow Palestinians to receive basic services as its army conducted a military campaign against Hamas in Gaza. It spoke as United Nations agencies have warned that Palestinians in Gaza were in danger of starvation.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said, “It is urgent… to dramatically increase the humanitarian assistance that’s getting to people inside of Gaza.
“The situation for children, for women, for men who are caught in this crossfire of Hamas’s making inside of Gaza is unacceptable and unsustainable. Israel has to maximize every possible means and method of getting assistance to people who need it.”
He spoke just before holding back-to-back meetings with Minister Benny Gantz and Qatari Prime Minister Mohammed Al Thani.
Need for improvement of humanitarian aid
The imperative of improved humanitarian aid was raised at all of Gantz’s meetings on Monday and Tuesday, during which time he spoke with Vice President Kamala Harris, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, and Middle East special envoy Brett McGurk.
US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin told Gantz he was very concerned about the issue of humanitarian aid. During his conversation, Gantz assured the US that Israel was committed to ensuring that an assistance architecture was in place to address the problem
Israel government spokesman Avi Hyman told reporters in Israel that “there is no limit on aid, but there are questions of distribution. We are working on a day-to-day basis to ensure that aid gets to the civilians of Gaza who need it.”
In Washington, National Security Communications Advisor John Kirby minced no words in stating that the situation was “unacceptable. We need the Israelis to step up and do more” as he clarified that the issue was with delivery and distribution.
Kirby explained that the US planned to do more airdrops of food bundles.
“This will be a part of a sustained effort with our international partners to scale up the amount of lifesaving aid that we’re getting into Gaza,” Kirby said.
The US is also pushing for a maritime option, Kirby explained, adding that “we’re looking at both military and commercial options to move assistance by sea. There’s still a lot of work being done on this to flesh it out.
“We’re also going to continue to urge Israel to facilitate more trucks and more routes opening up more crossings so that more aid can get into people in need and increase that flow,” Kirby said.
The most efficient way to get humanitarian aid into Gaza, he said, is through the land crossings. Kirby and other US officials stressed that a pause to the war was also necessary to allow for increased aid, given that the movement of goods in a combat zone was complicated.
The United States has no plans to send US troops into Gaza to bolster efforts to distribute aid, the Pentagon said on Tuesday, remarks that appeared to play down the idea of a US-military run port or other landing site for maritime aid distribution.
“At this time there are no plans to put US forces on the ground in Gaza,” Air Force Major General Patrick Ryder, the Pentagon’s chief spokesperson, told a news conference.
Reuters contributed to this report.
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