JERUSALEM: Thirteen major humanitarian groups Thursday warned it was now almost impossible to work in Gaza Strip, as one accused countries supplying arms to Israel of being complicit in what “amounts to genocide”.
President of Doctors Without Borders NGO, Isabelle Defourny, spoke out about the risk of genocide as major world aid groups blasted Israel for restricting aid getting into the Gaza Strip.
The killing of seven aid workers from the World Central Kitchen (WCK) based in the US, by Israeli air strikes on Monday has sparked global outcry.
President Biden said he was “outraged and heartbroken” by the strike.
However, president of MSF France, Defourny, said the United States, France, Britain and other nations were “morally and politically complicit with what to our eyes amounts to genocide” by providing military aid to Israel.
Aid groups also called on Israel to abandon plans for a ground attack on Rafah in southern Gaza, where more than a million civilians have fled.
The Gaza war, the bloodiest in history, began with an unprecedented attack by Hamas on October 7.
According to the Gaza Ministry of Health, the retaliatory operation of the Zionist regime ‘aimed at destroying Hamas’ has killed at least 33,037 people, most of whom were women and children.
WCK has suspended its activities in Gaza, but none of the 13 organizations that issued a joint appeal, including Oxfam and Save the Children, have announced they will withdraw from Gaza.
Defourny said MSF had lost five of its 300 staff in the Gaza Strip, and said the seven WCK staff killed were not surprising.
He said there are no conditions for providing humanitarian aid in Gaza.
“Because for the last six months we have witnessed the choices which Israel makes in waging war on an entire population, a population that is trapped, deprived of food and massively bombed.
“Gaza is progressively being made unfit for human life,” she added, it “has passed the threshold of absolute horror”.
President of MSF France said the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ordered “measures to prevent a genocide” in January and again last week but, she added, Israel has so far done the exact opposite, continuing to block humanitarian aid. She said Israel has destroyed vital civilian infrastructure in Gaza Strip.
Israel has, however, challenged accusations it is blocking aid, saying instead humanitarian groups have failed to distribute it.
The charity Oxfam said hungry people in northern Gaza are forced to eat an average of 245 calories a day, which is less than a can of beans, while the average recommended daily calorie intake is 2,100 per person.
Oxfam’s Scott Paul said almost half of the people in the North were actually “living on less”.
He said he will not be surprised if a famine is imminent or happens there.
The charity called for an immediate ceasefire, saying that Israel and the countries that supply it with arms have an obligation under international law to protect their people from atrocities.
