Tel Aviv [Israel], November 30: Yesterday morning (Vietnam time), the US announced the airlift of more than 24.5 tons of medical supplies, medicine and food to the logistics center in Egypt to provide humanitarian aid to civilians in the Gaza Strip.
The US military is responsible for transporting 3 batches of essential goods to Al-Arish City (North Sinai province, Egypt), the gathering point for aid supplies to the Gaza Strip . US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan confirmed that the first batch of goods had arrived at dawn on November 29 (Vietnam time).
The US leads the aid effort
Announcing on defense.gov , Brigadier General Pat Ryder, Pentagon Press Secretary, confirmed that at the request of the US Agency for International Development (USAID), aid shipments were delivered to the logistics center in City of Al-Arish by US Air Force C-17 Globemaster military transport aircraft.
From Al-Arish City, aid continues to be transported by road into the Gaza Strip and UN agencies are responsible for distributing it to people in conflict areas. Brigadier General Ryder said there will be more similar flights in the following days.
The latest aid deployment follows the food supply operation of more than 226.7 tons carried out by the US last week and transported by aircraft contracted with USAID. The US has mobilized 100 million USD for humanitarian support efforts for civilians affected in the Hamas-Israel conflict since October 7 and is by far the largest aid donor in the region.
After the first shipment of the new batch arrived, USAID Director Samantha Power said that the increase in aid to Gaza, which was made possible by the temporary ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas forces, should become the "new normal" for the people of the area.
"Increasing aid to Gaza is extremely important and that is why we, together with our international partners, seek to take advantage of every possible opportunity during this ceasefire, and also to ensure that the flow of Shipping and aid continues, and this will become the new normal," CNN quoted Ms. Power as saying.
The USAID director estimates that about 240 trucks have entered Gaza every day since the ceasefire agreement took effect on November 24. She said her goal is to increase the number of trucks and especially focus on providing fuel and winter goods in the context of colder weather. Ms. Power also hopes to soon be able to restart commercial goods flows in addition to aid shipments.
Regarding maintaining aid shipments when fighting recurs, USAID Director said the US is discussing this possibility with Israeli officials.
Ability to extend ceasefire period
November 30 is the end of the ceasefire in the Gaza Strip and Qatar continues to mediate to find ways to extend the agreement between Hamas and Israeli forces. Yesterday, AFP quoted an informed source as revealing that Hamas "has informed Qatari mediators that this force is ready to extend the ceasefire period for another 4 days" to release more hostages.
According to Reuters, Israel said it could extend the term of the agreement after Hamas continued to release at least 10 Israeli hostages every day. Negotiators in Doha (Qatar's capital) believe that the number of hostages who are women and children in the hands of Hamas allows the ceasefire period to be extended for another 2 days, before the discussion turns to the hostages. men and soldiers.
Meanwhile, WHO Director General TedrosAdhanomGhebreyesus warned on his X account (former name Twitter) that lack of infrastructure and lack of access to medicine are causing the epidemic to spread in the Gaza Strip. According to Mr. Tedros, more than 110,000 people have acute respiratory infections, more than 70,000 people have diarrhea and thousands have rashes, impetigo, chickenpox, jaundice...
The WHO leader called on all sides to continue to extend the ceasefire and find ways to improve to prevent the health disaster that is threatening the people of Gaza.
Source: ThanhNien Newspaper