Qatar announces Israel-Hamas deal to let aid into Gaza as well as medicine for captives.
Israel and Hamas reached a deal via Qatar mediation to allow the delivery of aid into Gaza, Doha announced late on Tuesday.
A communique published by Qatar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA) has announced the successful Qatari brokered agreement.
On Tuesday, Majed bin Mohammed Al Ansari, the official MoFA spokesperson was cited in the communique, saying that in cooperation with France, a deal has been reached and Gaza’s most vulnerable in the Strip’s most affected areas will receive much-needed aid.
“The medications and aid will leave Doha tomorrow to the city of Al-Arish in the sisterly Arab Republic of Egypt, on board two Qatari Armed Forces aircraft, in preparation for their transport into the Gaza Strip,” Al Ansari said.
In exchange, aid will also be delivered and distributed to captives held by Hamas in Gaza, the communique added.
Before MoFA’s announcement on Tuesday, The New Arab reported that families of Israeli captives met with Qatari Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, in Doha.
During the meeting, Sheikh Mohammed stressed that despite the challenges, he will persist in efforts towards the release of more captives.
The newly brokered deal coincides with a joint press release by eight special rapporteurs from the United Nations Human Rights Council published on Tuesday. In the statement, Israel is decried as having imposed a total siege of Gaza.
The rights experts added that this is depriving at least “2.3 million Palestinians of water, food, fuel, medicine, and medical supplies.”
The UN’s Office for the Coordination of Human Affairs’ latest impact report published on Tuesday also highlights the dire straits faced by the besieged Strip’s crippling health sector.
According to UN OCHA, there are “critical shortages” of medicines, blood and fuel in hospitals that are being severely rationed.
Just one out of the three water pipelines from Israel to Gaza is functional, UN OCHA added.
This is a tragic decrease from an earlier UN OCHA impact report published on Sunday, which said two pipelines were working.
The enclave’s northern governorates are also completely cut off from fresh water supplies.
According to Philippe Lalliot, head of France’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs Crisis Centre, the newly announced brokered agreement has been weeks in the making, Al Jazeera reported on Tuesday.
During an interview on French radio, Lalliot added, “There were 36 hospitals in Gaza before the start of the war. [Now,] there are 15 which are functioning partially.
“We are in a dangerous humanitarian disaster. With the winter, it can only get worse,” he said.
In the Qatari MoFA communique published on Tuesday, the ministry’s spokesperson affirmed that the Gulf state will continue working cooperatively with its regional and international partners to ensure “an end to the war in Gaza.”
