When Christopher Lockyear, the secretary-general of the aid group Doctors Without Borders, visited the Gaza Strip for five days this month, he noted the miles of trucks waiting to deliver aid to the devastated enclave despite growing international pressure to increase shipments.
On Thursday, the International Court of Justice in The Hague responded to the ongoing problems by ordering Israel to ensure the “provision of unimpeded assistance” to Gaza, using some of its strongest language. Israel has rejected accusations that it is responsible for aid delays, and did so again last week.
“It’s not just the number of trucks coming to the border,” Mr. Lockyear said in an interview Saturday. “It’s about what happens after that point. It’s about tradition. This is sustainable healthcare. This is clean water.”
In its ruling on Thursday, the ICJ, the United Nations’ top court, called on Israel to increase the number of land crossings for aid and asked it to ensure that its army does not violate Palestinians’ rights under the Genocide Convention, ” including by preventing, through any action, the provision of urgently needed humanitarian assistance’.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Israel he responded saying that Israel had made every effort to mitigate civilian casualties and facilitate the flow of aid to Gaza, “including in particular food, water, shelter equipment and medicine.”
On October 9 — two days after Hamas attacked southern Israel and launched Israel’s war on Gaza — Israel imposed what it called a “total siege” of the territory. Since then, aid to Gaza has only been allowed through restrictive measures controlled by Israel. These rules also apply to aid sent by the United Nations and groups such as Doctors Without Borders, known by its French acronym, MSF
Last week, Mr. Lockyear said, an MSF truck carrying medical supplies and equipment was blocked from entering Gaza because it was carrying metal devices used to create broken bones. “These items, which were previously approved to enter, we have brought into Gaza before,” Mr Lockyear said. This time, he said, “the whole truck turned around because these objects were there and we don’t know why.”
A spokeswoman for the Israeli authority in charge of aid to Gaza said the authority could find no record or information about an MSF truck that was rejected or rejected.
Israel has previously said it blocks or restricts the entry of what it calls “dual-use” items — materials or items it says Hamas could use for military purposes.
Mr Lockyear said his five-day visit to Gaza, both in the southern city of Rafah and Deir al-Balah in the central part of the territory, underlined for him the critical importance of not only ensuring that sufficient aid reaches Gaza and is distributed properly and safely, but also the need to end the conflict itself.
The dangerous effects of the humanitarian disaster and ongoing military operations came into focus, he said, during a visit to Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir al-Ballah on March 19, the morning after the area suffered another heavy bombardment.
The wards and corridors were filled with injured victims with burns, shrapnel wounds and broken limbs, including some who needed amputation. Meanwhile, a steady stream of emaciated and malnourished children was brought in.
“One of the most shocking things there is the decision the medical teams there had to make in terms of: Do they give beds to trauma patients or do they give beds to malnourished children?” he said.
On Saturday, the director-general of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, called for an increase in evacuations from Gaza. With battered hospitals struggling to care for the sick and wounded, he wrote in a post on X, “around 9,000 patients must be urgently evacuated abroad for life-saving health services, including treatment for cancer, shelling injuries, kidney dialysis and other chronic diseases.”
He urged Israel to authorize more evacuations, saying: “Every moment counts.”
