‘Long List of Banned Items’ – From Maternity Kits to Wheelchairs, Israel Blocks Gaza Aid
Jamie McGoldrick, the UN humanitarian coordinator for the occupied Palestinian territory, said that if one item is rejected during an inspection, the entire truck is sent back.
Generators for hospitals, ventilators, water pumps and wheelchairs are among the items rejected by Israeli authorities for entry into the besieged Gaza Strip, the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) has said.
The agency on Thursday also listed maternity kits and ultrasound equipment as denied goods, in a post on X.
According to a report in the Washington Post, anesthetics, chemical water quality testing kits, surgical tools for doctors, crutches, toys in wooden boxes and even chocolate croissants are among the items that the UN and other aid agencies say Israeli authorities have also blocked from entering Gaza “at least once” since October 7.
Jamie McGoldrick, the UN humanitarian coordinator for the occupied Palestinian territory, reportedly said that if one item is rejected during an inspection, the entire truck is sent back, the report stated.
“Limited scanning machines and operational hours at border inspection sites slow down the delivery of aid,” the paper reported him as saying.
‘Dual Use’
According to the Post’s report, McGoldrick said that earlier this year “insulin pens for children were denied entry.” This came “after a mixed-cargo truck was rejected apparently because of solar panels.”
“You’d think after 5½ months of a crisis of this kind, the systems in place would be a bit more predictable and settled. In fact, they are not. And that’s why we’re struggling,” McGoldrick was quoted as saying by the paper.
Gaza has been crippled by a land, air and sea blockade imposed by Israel since 2007.
The Post said that “Israel’s dual-use list, when it comes to Gaza, far exceeds the internationally recognized standard for such items,” according to aid groups.
The paper quotes Miriam Marmur, public advocacy director of the Israeli human rights group Gisha, as saying that the list “includes broad categories that contain potentially thousands of items, making it very difficult to know if any specific item is on the list or not.”“
She added: “This has impacted, for years, many, many aspects of everyday life on the Strip.”
Last month, the Commissioner-General for UNRWA, Philippe Lazzarini, posted on X: “A truck loaded with aid has just been turned back because it had scissors used in children’s medical kits.”
He said medical scissors were now “added to a long list of banned items the Israeli Authorities classify as ‘for dual use’.”
“The clearance of humanitarian supplies + the delivery of basic & critical items need to be facilitated & accelerated. The lives of 2 million people depend on that, there is no time to waste,” Lazzarini stressed.
‘A Moral Outrage’
Israel has been under pressure to allow much-needed humanitarian aid into the enclave, particularly in the north where at least 15 children have already died due to malnutrition and dehydration, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
US President Joe Biden has rebuked Israel for not doing enough to ensure that humanitarian aid is getting into the enclave.
“It’s not enough,” he said during a press briefing on Wednesday. “But it needs to be — be more, and there’s one more opening that has to take place in the north.”
The US president held a telephone discussion with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last Thursday following the Israeli airstrike that killed seven aid workers.
Biden said the Israeli leader “agreed to do several things that related to, number one, getting more aid — both food and medicine — into Gaza and reducing significantly the attempts — the civilian casualties in any action taken in the region.”
“So, we’ll see what he does in terms of meeting the commitments he made to me,” Biden stressed.
Last month, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, during a visit to the Egyptian side of the Rafah crossing, said the long line of blocked trucks was a moral outrage.
“Here from this crossing, we see the heartbreak and heartlessness of it all. A long line of blocked relief trucks on one side of the gates, the long shadow of starvation on the other,” he said. “That is more than tragic. It is a moral outrage.”
No Food Convoys Since Jan
UNRWA, the largest humanitarian aid organization in Gaza, said it continues to “face disproportionate restrictions” on access to the besieged enclave, with no food convoys approved to the north since January.
Following reports of imminent famine, “40.5 per cent of all food missions have been denied in February and March,” UNRWA said in its latest Situation Report, of April 4 – 7, 2024.
“UNRWA was last able to deliver food to the north at the end of January,” it said.
Over 33,500 Killed
Currently on trial before the International Court of Justice for genocide against Palestinians, Israel has been waging a devastating war on Gaza since October 7.
According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health, 33,545 Palestinians have been killed, and 76,0949 wounded in Israel’s ongoing genocide in the enclave since October 7.
Moreover, at least 7,000 people are unaccounted for, presumed dead under the rubble of their homes throughout the Strip.
Palestinian and international organizations say that the majority of those killed and wounded are women and children.
The Israeli war has resulted in an acute famine, mostly in northern Gaza, resulting in the death of many Palestinians, mostly children.
The Israeli aggression has also resulted in the forceful displacement of nearly two million people from all over the Gaza Strip, with the vast majority of the displaced forced into the densely crowded southern city of Rafah near the border with Egypt – in what has become Palestine’s largest mass exodus since the 1948 Nakba.
Israel says that 1,200 soldiers and civilians were killed during the Al-Aqsa Flood Operation on October 7. Israeli media published reports suggesting that many Israelis were killed on that day by ‘friendly fire’.
(The Palestine Chronicle
