Humanitarian aid deliveries by air or sea cannot “substitute” those by land routes, the UN aid coordinator for the Palestinian enclave stressed yesterday Thursday.

“I have referred to the importance of diversifying land supply routes. This is the optimal solution: it is easier, faster, cheaper, especially because we know that we need continuous humanitarian aid for the people of Gaza for a long period of time,” Sigrid Kaach emphasized during a closed-door meeting of the Security Council.

Referring to the recent airstrikes by the US and other countries, she praised this “symbol of support for civilians in Gaza”, a “proof of our shared humanity”, but pointed out that this was a “drop in the ocean”.

“Air and sea cannot replace deliveries by land,” insisted the former Dutch minister, who was named aid coordinator in December following a Security Council resolution calling for “large-scale” aid deliveries to the Palestinian enclave. Although he acknowledged that anything “extra at this critical moment is very important.”

He expressed satisfaction with the US announcement that a temporary port will be built in the Gaza Strip to deliver humanitarian aid by sea, noting that other “major countries” will also participate in the “sea corridor” from Cyprus.

The SA members “reaffirmed the importance of responding to the urgent humanitarian needs in Gaza through all possible channels,” said Yamazaki Kazuyuki, Japan’s ambassador to the United Nations. Japan holds the rotating presidency of the top UN body in March.

Asked about the main obstacles to the delivery of aid to the population in the Gaza Strip, Sigrid Kaah called for more land crossings to be opened and also touched on the complicated process of border controls.

And as “the fighting continues and the world is desperate,” the social fabric is “torn apart” and “lawlessness” increases, “it is increasingly difficult for us,” once checks are made, “to receive and distribute” aid “safely “, he added.

The spokesman for the UN Secretary-General, Stephane Dujarric, explained yesterday that trucks arriving at the crossing point at Rafah, on the border of the Gaza Strip with Egypt, must, after being inspected, be unloaded on the Palestinian side: the aid is loaded onto other vehicles, often smaller, the number of which is not sufficient.

The war broke out on October 7, triggered by an unprecedented attack by Hamas’ military arm on Israel, which killed more than 1,160 people, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli data. In the Gaza Strip, at least 30,800 people have lost their lives so far, the vast majority of them civilians, according to the latest casualty count released by the Hamas Health Ministry.