Gaza aid port plans ‘sign of international weakness’: Amnesty chief

Humanitarian aid for Gaza is loaded on a platform next to a rescue vessel of the Spanish NGO Open Arms at the port of Larnaca, Cyprus March 11, 2024. (Reuters)

• Gaza is suffering a severe humanitarian crisis as Israel’s war on Hamas drags on, with the UN warning of looming famine as the flow of aid trucks has slowed

MADRID: Efforts to deliver aid to war-torn Gaza by constructing a seaport or through airdrops are a sign of international powerlessness to tend the conflict, the head of Amnesty International said on Wednesday.

Gaza is suffering a severe humanitarian crisis as Israel’s war on Hamas drags on, with the UN warning of looming famine as the flow of aid trucks from Egypt has slowed.

With only a small fraction of the basic supplies needed to sustain Gaza’s 2.4 million people coming in by land, foreign governments have turned to airdrops and a maritime corridor from Cyprus.

But Agnes Callamard, Amnesty’s secretary-general, said nobody was holding Israel to account over the delays to deliveries by land.

“The international community must be prepared to hold Israel to account ... We’re not holding the stick that will allow for those violations to stop,” she said in Madrid.

“So the airdrops, the construction of a port, are a sign of powerlessness and weakness on the part of the international community.”

Earlier this month, US President Joe Biden said Washington was planning to establish a temporary port for aid deliveries to Gaza, which the Pentagon said would take up to 60 days and involve 1,000 US personnel.

But Callamard said it was a “huge concern” that the international community seemed to have accepted that the deadly conflict would drag on for another two months.

“A huge concern is that the proposed investment into building a port and transporting humanitarian assistance via sea appears to indicate that the international community ... are expecting the situation to last. Why are you making an investment that is going to take two months?” she said.

“That is extremely worrisome. More than 30,000 people have died.”

Separately, Israeli lawmakers gave their final approval on Wednesday to an amended 2024 state budget that adds tens of billions of shekels to fund Israel’s Gaza war as the conflict runs into its sixth month.

The amended budget adds more spending on defense and compensation to households and businesses hurt by the war.

Members of the Knesset, or parliament, voted 63-55 in favor of the spending package of 584 billion shekels ($160 billion), or 724 billion including debt repayment. 

“The amended war budget ... has clear goals — to win the war, support the reservists, strengthen the home front and continue to grow the Israeli economy,” Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said after the vote.