Egypt today sent 80 trucks of humanitarian aid, destined for the Gaza Strip, to the second checkpoint opened by Israel, as Israeli military operations in the Palestinian enclave continue unabated following the October 7 attack by Hamas. .

At the same time, another 100 trucks were inspected at the Nitsana checkpoint, between Egypt and Israel.

To date, this has been the only one Israel has opened to inspect trucks carrying humanitarian aid into the besieged Gaza Strip through the Rafah crossing.

On Monday night, the Israeli military announced the opening of a second checkpoint, in Kerem Shalom, claiming it would double the amount of humanitarian aid brought into the Palestinian enclave.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) welcomed the opening of the checkpoint in Kerem Shalom, which is a few kilometers from Rafah, underlining that it is speeding up the process of delivering humanitarian aid to the people of Gaza. He pointed out that since the collapse of the truce on December 1, about 100 trucks of humanitarian aid enter the Gaza Strip on average every day, when before the start of the war between Israel and Hamas the daily average was five times that.

“Today we inspected the first humanitarian aid convoy in Kerem Shalom before it reached the Rafah crossing in order to prevent the possibility of weapons being trafficked to Hamas,” Israeli government spokesman Eilon Levi said.

The Gaza Strip has been relentlessly pounded by the Israeli armed forces since the unprecedented attack launched by Hamas on October 7, which killed around 1,200 people, mostly civilians. Since the start of the war, more than 18,400 Palestinians have been killed in the Gaza Strip, according to a tally by the health ministry in the Hamas-controlled Palestinian enclave.