Also food drops cannot help the population in Gaza

If Gaza is an open -air prison, is the air still an ultimate option to reach the starving population? Can food drops – although notoriously unsafe and inefficient – be a final resort?

It is a ridiculous solution, say emergency aid experts. After all Five thousand trucks With relief supplies in the region to wait until they can cross the border that the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had hermetically closed at the beginning of March. One word from him and the thousands of children who enter into the most serious stages of malnutrition can be saved.

There are activists who try to reach Gaza through the Mediterranean. This Friday reported The International NGO Freedom Flotilla Coalition that their ship was attacked with drones in international waters near Malta, creating a fire on board. A rescue campaign by Malta has brought the passengers to safety. The organization suspects that Israel has carried out the attack.

Netanyahu has been unyielding for two months. Hamas steals relief supplies, said The prime minister on March 2, and that’s why he decided that there is nothing more Gaza. He also says he wants to increase the pressure on Hamas to release the remaining Israeli hostages. He did not say why this would justify the starving of two million civilians.

Last week that question was for it Court of Justice in The Hague, at the request of the General Meeting of the United Nations. However, the ruling can take months to come. Moreover, Israel ignores previous assignments from the court.

Latest Stocks

The Hague reality is far from that in Gaza, where the need is by now extreme. UN organizations have their Latest Stocks Given to the soup kitchens and expect that they will be finished within a few days. Their bakeries already closed at the end of March. If there is no change, large numbers of people will die from hunger.

Food droppings, airdrops In Jargon, the most most amazing way of emergency assistance is: much less charge fits in an aircraft than in a truck. Flying is also much more expensive than road transport. The load must be dropped from parachutes and land in a safe place.

The latter is difficult, especially in a densely populated area such as Gaza. Rescuers must be ready to distribute the food in an orderly way to people who take on what they can take because of their despair. They must also prevent the packages from falling into the hands of warring parties. In short, AirDrops are often far too limited, very complex and cost a multitude of road help.

Yet a year ago dozens of airdrops above Gaza were carried out, through a coalition of states, including the Netherlands. Help about land was not entirely forbidden at that time, but even then far too little was allowed in. Neighboring country Jordan coordinated the AirDrops and had set up a multinational AirDrop planning cell, where the Dutch armed forces had also stationed an officer.

36,000 ready-made meals

The Netherlands carried out its first two airdrops in February last year, written The then Rutte IV cabinet to the Lower House, and then a few in March and April. Other countries in the coalition included Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, the United States, Singapore and a number of Western European states. To give an impression of the size: in one flight Of the US Air Force were 36,000 ready-made meals. That is not nothing, but given the need a drop on a glowing plate.

In some cases – it is unknown to which – the AirDrops lives cost. According to the authorities in Gaza, it was certain on March 8 Five dead Because a parachute did not open and the package fell on top of them. Later that month, six people died when they were walked under the base for drugged packages.

To prevent accidents, the packages were sometimes deliberately thrown into the Mediterranean Sea, after which they drove to the coast with the tide and the wind. At the end of March 2024 this ran wrong Af, when Gazanen went into the sea to get them. At least twelve people drowned, including someone who became entangled in a parachute.

Since February of this year, no more Dutch officers have been active at the planning cell in Jordan, says the Ministry of Defense when asked. And since the resumption of the Israeli offensive in Gaza on March 18, the cell is no longer active at all. The Jordanian authorities no longer receive permission from Israel to enter the airspace and to carry out help flights, according to Defense.

This makes the end of story, says the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Last year that permission was there, now there is also no help to Gaza through the air. Still entering the airspace would lead to a diplomatic incident. In addition, Foreign Affairs points to the deteriorated situation on the ground. Due to the ongoing fighting and the lack of protection of care providers, the safe reception and distribution of the help is ‘virtually impossible’.

Height

Thinking aloud, Lieutenant General comes out of service Mart de Kruif, former commander of the land forces, in one theoretical way to get food Gaza in these circumstances. « You could investigate whether a haho drop is possible. » Haho is the abbreviation of High Altitude, High Opening. “You throw the packages of a great height outside the Israeli airspace, so above the Mediterranean, and you calculate their sliding flight in such a way that they end up in Gaza on the wind. There are technical systems with which you can steer this exactly. In Afghanistan we have this way Special Forces Supply deep in enemy territory. « 

The chance that this works is extremely small, says De Kruif. « You do not enter the airspace yourself, but of course that help do. You therefore have to count on Israel to shoot the packages out of the sky. » Would Israel really put the Iron Dome rocket shield into operation for floating ready-made meals? « No, they will not waste expensive rockets on that. But they can send combat aircraft on it. » This method would therefore make AirDrops even more cumbersome and the result is even more poor than it is.

States with influence, such as the US and the EU Member States, can force Israel to let the help through

It Global Center for the Responsibility to Protecta think tank in New York, Airdrops resolutely rejects, but not just for reasons of feasibility. The Responsibility to Protect is an international standard, adopted in 2005 by the UN, which prescribes that states feel responsible for intervening if a population is not protected by its own leaders against genocide or other serious crimes. The center believes that the US and the European Union are now seriously inadequate.

It writes by e-mail: « Israel’s deliberate blockade of life-saving help comes down to persistent, intentional starvation of a civilian population. That is a war crime for which the International Criminal Court has issued arrest trips. States cannot use AirDrops to divert attention to all political, diplomatic, diplomatic »

« States with influence, such as the US and the EU member states, can force Israel to let the help through. They must implement the arrest trips of the Criminal Court, forbid that Israeli officials fly through their airspace, set sanctions and the export of weapons to Israel is completely striking. to make. »

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