Jordanian army air-drops humanitarian aid into Gaza
- 26 Feb 2024
The Jordanian army on Monday said it had carried out a series of humanitarian aid drops of food and other supplies into the besieged Gaza Strip, one of them by a French army plane.
The operation deployed four C-130 planes including one belonging to the French air force, army spokesperson Mustafa Hiyari said.
Aid was dropped to 11 sites along the Gaza coast from its northern edge to the south for civilians to collect, Hiyari told Reuters. Previous air drops that parachuted in medicines and humanitarian provisions were sent to hospitals the Jordanian army runs in Gaza.
Jordanian forces made "four air drops carrying aid for the people of Gaza," under the directive of Jordanian King Abdullah II, a statement said.
The operation came on the same day that two human rights groups accused Israel of further limiting humanitarian aid into Gaza — where the UN has warned of famine — despite an order from the UN's top court.
Jordan has conducted a total of 16 air-drop operations since the war broke out on Oct.7.
Previously announced air drops, including a joint operation with the Netherlands, sent medical and other aid to the Jordanian field hospital in northern Gaza.
Monday's operation "aimed at delivering aid to the population directly and drop it along the coast of the Gaza Strip from north to south," the Jordanian army statement said.
It comprised "relief and food supplies, including ready-made meals of high nutritional value, to alleviate the suffering of the people of the Gaza Strip", the statement added.
"Four C-130 aircraft, one of them belonging to the French armed forces," carried out the deliveries, it said.
The cargo floated down on parachutes from the transport aircraft, including over the southern Gaza Strip where around 1.4 million Gazans have converged.
King Abdullah warns of dangers of Israel's planned Rafah assault
Also during the day, Jordan's King Abdullah warned of the dangers of a military operation planned by Israel in Rafah and reiterated his appeal for an immediate ceasefire to help protect civilians in Gaza and bring in aid, the royal palace said.
The king also said the only way to end the decades-old conflict was to find a "political horizon" for Palestinians that would lead to the creation of a Palestinian state on territory Israel occupied in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, including east Jerusalem.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said earlier this week the Israeli security cabinet would approve military plans for Rafah — including the evacuation of more than a million displaced Palestinian civilians who have been sheltering there, and whose fate worries world powers.
Almost 30,000 Palestinians have been killed in the war, Gaza medical officials say.
Agencies