image source, Getty Images
Children in Gaza wait with empty pots at a food distribution center
Israel said it had approved the opening of three humanitarian routes into Gaza to enable more aid to the Gaza Strip.
Erez Gate in northern Gaza is temporarily reopened for the first time since the start of the war.
The Port of Ashdod will be opened for the delivery of humanitarian supplies, allowing more aid from Jordan to enter the country via the Kerem Shalom crossing.
This came hours after US President Joe Biden told the Israeli prime minister that the situation in Gaza was “unacceptable.”
According to a reading of a phone call between Biden and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the president warned that if Israel wants to maintain U.S. aid, it must take steps to prevent civilian harm and humanitarian suffering.
The reopening of the corridor is understood to have been specifically requested by Biden during the phone call.
The two continued to speak by phone after seven World Central Kitchen (WCK) relief workers were killed on Monday.
The WCK convoy came under Israeli airstrike on Monday night as it headed south along an Israeli-designated coastal support route, shortly after offloading more than 100 tons of food from a barge at a warehouse in Deir al-Balah.
The US National Security Council welcomed the measures announced by Israel, saying they “need to be fully and quickly implemented now.”
He added that U.S. policy is determined by steps taken by Israel to protect “the safety of innocent civilians and aid workers.”
On Thursday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that if the US does not recognize changes in Israel, US policy will change.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faces growing anger at home and abroad over Israel’s actions in Gaza.
Long lines of trucks carrying aid supplies have been backed up on the Egyptian side of the border with Rafah for months, as they can only enter Gaza after passing through a complex and bureaucratic series of Israeli checks.
A lack of adequate humanitarian supplies has forced Jordan, the United States and the United Kingdom to drop aid by air, which is the least effective method of delivering humanitarian supplies.
However, Palestinians were crushed when their parachutes failed, or drowned while trying to swim across to pallets that had fallen into the sea.
A recent UN-backed report provided evidence that Gaza’s humanitarian catastrophe is turning into a man-made famine.
And Volker Türk, the UN’s most senior human rights official, recently told the BBC there was a “plausible” case that Israel was using starvation as a weapon of war in Gaza.
