Ship loaded with 200 tons of food continues at a slow pace on today’s route to the Gaza Strip, at a time when efforts are accelerating for more humanitarian aid to reach the besieged enclavewhere the population is threatened by famine in the midst of Ramadan.

Humanitarian aid distribution in the enclave however remains frequent dangerous undertaking. Yesterday Monday, the UN agency for Palestine refugees (UNRWA) announced that its warehouse in Rafah, in the southern part of the Gaza Strip, was hit by an Israeli airstrike, killing at least one of its workers and injuring others. The Health Ministry of Hamas, for its part, spoke of four dead.

Following more than five months of war between Israel and Hamas, UN expresses concern over widespread famine in Gaza Stripwhere tens of thousands of people have been killed and Israeli shelling continues unabated.

The attack “against one of the few UNRWA distribution centers still operational in the Gaza Strip recorded when malnutrition, as well as famine in some areas, it is expanding”underlined Philippe Lazzarini, the head of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East.

From his side, the Israeli army announced the “elimination of a Hamas operative in a “targeted” strike in Rafah. The man, Mohammad Abu Hasna, was among the four dead claimed by the Palestinian Islamist movement and identified as the warehouse’s security officer.

Late yesterday Wednesday the Hamas health ministry also reported four deaths and many injured by Israeli fire at the “Kuwait” roundabout, a crossroads in the southern Gaza Strip where food is often distributed.

Land and sea

Aid by land routes is only trickling down to the Gaza Strip. It is under the control of Israel, which has imposed a total siege on the Palestinian enclave since the first days of the war, which was triggered by an unprecedented Hamas attack on southern Israel on October 7.

A first ship, chartered by the Spanish NGO Open Arms, loaded with 200 tons of food, left yesterday from Larnaca. He continued on his way to the enclave. According to the specialist website Vessel Finder, the ship, moving at very low speed, it is still 90 nautical miles (175 km) from the Gaza coast.

Cyprusthe EU country closest to the Palestinian enclave than any other — some 370 kilometers from the Palestinian enclave — has assured that it is ready to depart a second ship, with a “much larger” load.

Four ships of the US Navy left the USA yesterday Tuesday, with about a hundred military personnel and the necessary equipment to set up a wharf in the Gaza Strip so that humanitarian aid can be delivered. The trip will take about 30 days, and the facility is expected to be ready “within 60 days,” according to Washington.

However, these efforts are only a band-aid solutionstresses the UN, for which neither sending aid by sea nor airdrops are enough to replace land routes, a finding shared by many.

“There is no substitute for land routes through Egypt and Jordan and entry points from Israel into Gaza for large-scale aid deliveries”the US, Cyprus, the United Arab Emirates, the EU and Qatar said in a joint statement released by the State Department.

They even decided how opening the Israeli port of Ashdod to humanitarian aid would constitute “welcome and important addition” in the efforts made.

Currently, overland aid arrives via Egypt or Jordan to two Israeli checkpoints in the southern Gaza Strip where cargo is subjected to scrutiny.

Last Tuesday, for the first time, Israel’s military approved the entry, “pilot”, of World Food Program trucks (PED) in the northern Gaza Strip, which raised hopes that aid deliveries could be accelerated to meet the enormous needs of the enclave’s 2.4 million residents.

Business in Rafa?

The attack by the military arm of Hamas in southern Israel resulted in the loss of 1,160 lives, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli data. According to Israeli sources, 130 hostages are still in the Gaza Strip — but at least 32 of them are believed to be dead — of the more than 250 who were kidnapped on October 7.

In retaliation, Israel has vowed to “eliminate” Hamaswhich, like the US and the EU, characterizes as a “terrorist” organization, and the operations carried out since then by the Israeli army have killed at least 31,272 people in the Gaza Strip, the vast majority of them women and children, according to the Ministry of Health of Hamas.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has announced that ground operations will continue in Rafah, on the closed border with Egypt, where some 1.5 million forcibly displaced Palestinians fled and are now trapped. This prospect worries the international community, including the US, Israel’s main ally.

Israel should make the protection of civilians and the distribution of humanitarian aid in the Gaza Strip his “number one” priority, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said yesterday.

According to Politico, the Biden administration has indicated to Israel that it would support targeted strikes against Hamas in Rafah, but not a full-scale ground attack.

Washington is still trying, along with Qatar and Egypt, two other key mediators, to secure an agreement to declare a six-week ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. Overnight, Hamas leader Ismail Haniya ruled that a deal remains possible, calling on Israel — which rejects a permanent ceasefire and would only accept a temporary cessation of hostilities — while demanding a detailed list of of hostages in life—”to give up his intransigence.”