Mahmoud Shalabi, an aid worker with the Medical Aid for Palestinians group, said the aid shipments that Israel allowed to cross into Gaza were a “drop in the ocean of the needs” required to address the rapidly worsening humanitarian crisis there.
Speaking to The Associated Press Monday evening from his home in Beit Lahia in northern Gaza, Shalabi said that the aid had not arrived in the northern part of the strip, which Israel wants to empty ahead of its looming ground invasion.
He said the supplies in the first convoy on Saturday were distributed only to bakeries in the southern parts of Gaza, leaving the northern half struggling amid extremely dire conditions.
“The north didn’t receive anything. It’s like a death sentence for the people in the north of Gaza there,” he said.
A source familiar with the progress of the Hamas hostage release talks being brokered by Qatar was cited by BBC as saying that negotiations to get more people freed from Gaza had entered a "serious stage".
Hamas was said to have given a "positive response" regarding the release of about 50 foreign and dual-national civilian hostages in exchange for a ceasefire and the entry of more aid into Gaza, BBC said.
More than 19,000 people have been displaced in Lebanon amid an uptick in tensions between Israel and Hezbollah at the country's southern border, figures released Monday by a United Nations agency showed.
The death toll in the Gaza Strip has climbed to 5,087 with 15,273 injured, according to the Health Ministry.
They have also added that 436 Palestinians have been killed, including 183 children, in Israeli airstrikes in the past 24 hours.
Israel said Monday it had launched more than 300 strikes on the Gaza Strip within 24 hours, killing dozens according to the Hamas rulers of the besieged Palestinian territory.
