'Delay after delay' marks aid to Gaza through Israel, says WHO

Getting humanitarian aid through Israel into Gaza is layered with "delay after delay", the World Health Organisation said on Friday, as it decried "chronic shortages" of medical supplies.

Reinhilde Van de Weerdt, the WHO's representative in the Palestinian territories, said the health situation in the Gaza Strip "remains utterly dire", with none of its hospitals fully functional.

"Not enough humanitarian aid is entering Gaza, and definitely not enough to allow for a meaningful expansion and restoration of health services," she told reporters in Geneva, speaking from Jerusalem.

She said Israel's approval system for medical and other humanitarian supplies was proving a major bottleneck.

"It is laborious, time-consuming, with no guaranteed results," she said.

Based on the WHO's latest analysis, large volumes of medical supplies wait for clearance for a median of 74 days, said Van de Weerdt, adding that if it is not, "than we start that lengthy, cumbersome process all over again".

She added remarked the approval system kept changing, with new regulations introduced.

Pro-Palestinian supporters march towards the US Embassy during a rally denouncing the US and Israel military actions in Gaza, in Seoul on Saturday. Associated Press

Van de Weerdt added standard health kits used worldwide had the lowest approval rate, while X-ray machines, sterilisation equipment and spare parts for CT scans and other essential machinery "get rejected regularly".

"In just the last six months alone, one shipment of prosthetics and assistive devices was rejected four separate times," she said.

However, medicines move "relatively well", with almost 87 percent approved and one percent rejected, she added.

Israel says it is preventing the entry of items that could also have military use as it accuses Hamas – which carried out the worst-ever attack against Israel on October 7, 2023 – of plotting further violence.

'Release the pressure'

"It's not one single blockage. It's a system, layered with delay after delay... and on the other side of every one of these delays is a patient who is waiting," she said.

"We need the unimpeded and predicable entry of humanitarian and health supplies into Gaza, at scale.

"We hope that Israel will at least release the pressure on medical supplies."

Van de Weerdt called for more crossings into the territory to be opened, and for "clear, published guidance" on processes and requirements.

She added that success should not be measured in terms of numbers of trucks crossing the border, insisting that it says "almost nothing about whether people's actual health needs are being met".

"A truck full of non-priority supplies, or the right supplies arriving too late, doesn't save lives."

The Gaza war was sparked by Hamas's unprecedented 2023 attack against Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,221 people, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.

The massive Israeli offensive in response has left most of Gaza in ruins and killed more than 74,000 people, according to Gaza's health ministry, which is under Hamas authority and whose figures are considered reliable by the United Nations.

Agence France-Presse