Palestinian children carry pots as they queue to receive food cooked by a charity kitchen in Rafah on Friday. Reuters

Jamal Jama Al Musharakh, the UAE’s Permanent Representative to the UN and other international organisations in Geneva, affirmed that the UAE is collaborating with the international community to achieve an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.

The UAE condemned in the strongest terms Israel’s policy of collectively punishing the Palestinian people and its attempts to displace them, while emphasising the significance of the international community adopting a unified set of criteria to condemn violations of international humanitarian law.

This statement came at an event of the high-level Ministerial meeting convened on the sidelines of the 75th anniversary of the Geneva Declaration on Human Rights.

During the meeting, entitled: ‘Human Rights situation in the occupied Palestinian Territory, The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and the International Humanitarian Law (IHL),’ Al Musharakh stated that the UAE is committed to steadfastly collaborating with international parties to achieve an immediate ceasefire and to halt all military operations in Gaza for humanitarian reasons, in addition to restoring peace, preventing further loss of life, safeguarding and providing full protection for civilians.

Al Musharakh emphasised that stemming from its unwavering efforts to stand in solidarity with the brotherly Palestinian people, the UAE has been keen to provide humanitarian aid in cooperation with the relevant international organisations for the people impacted by the conflict, particularly children, women, the elderly, and the sick, highlighting that the UAE has dispatched planes carrying food, medical, and relief supplies, as well as basic needs.

Jamal Jama Al Musharakh

Meanwhile, the Emirati humanitarian institutions distributed 6,865 food parcels to 34,325 displaced people in Gaza.

The Emirates Red Crescent (ERC) team also installed 25 tents in Rafah Tal Al Sultan, west of the city of Khaled Bin Al Walid District, from which 150 beneficiaries benefited.

Furthermore, the country has also established a fully-equipped integrated field hospital in the Gaza Strip, and has hosted wounded children and patients in the UAE’s hospitals. Moreover, the UAE organised, in cooperation with the Arab Republic of Egypt, a visit by 12 UN Security Council Member States to the Rafah crossing, to provide Council Members with insight into the suffering faced by Palestinians and to examine firsthand the level of destruction in Gaza, as well as the progress of aid, medical, and humanitarian operations.

President Mahmoud Abbas said Gaza was an "integral part" of the Palestinian state during talks with a top US official at his West Bank headquarters Friday, his office said.

Abbas told visiting US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan that "Gaza is an integral part of the State of Palestine," his office said in a statement, adding that "the president underscored that separation or any attempt to isolate any part of it is unacceptable."

The Emirati humanitarian institutions distributed 6,865 food parcels to 34,325 displaced people in Gaza.

Also on Friday, Israel reopened an aid crossing into Gaza as key backer the United States urged more restraint in its all-out offensive against Hamas.

Under pressure to do more to spare civilians, Israel announced it would allow the "temporary" entry of aid into Gaza through a second crossing, at Kerem Shalom near Rafah, the only other point of entry for humanitarian supplies.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) welcomed the announcement by Israel that it would allow the temporary delivery of aid into the Gaza Strip via its Kerem Shalom border crossing. WHO called for the aid to be distributed throughout the embattled Palestinian territory. In Washington, US President Joe Biden reiterated calls for greater care for Gazan civilians.

"I want them to be focused on how to save civilian lives — not stop going after Hamas, but be more careful," said Biden.

Western nations and the European Union on Friday urged Israel to "take concrete steps to halt unprecedented violence by Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank," in a joint statement published by France's foreign ministry.

The call from Australia, Britain, Canada, France, the European Union and several other European countries — but notably excluding Germany and the US — highlighted "an unprecedented number of attacks perpetrated by extremist settlers" since early October that they said had claimed eight Palestinian lives and wounded 83 people.

Meanwhile, a journalist for Turkish agency Anadolu was severely assaulted by Israeli police while trying to take photos of Palestinians praying in East Jerusalem.

WAM / Agencies