by Belle Carter, Natural News:
The U.K.-based news agency Middle East Eye (MEE) recently found out and reported that at least 357 humanitarian-run sites and convoys in Gaza, whose coordinates had been shared in advance with warring parties, were hit before the non-profit World Central Kitchen (WCK) attack this month.
According to a top United Nations (UN) official, “nothing substantive” has changed in the deconfliction system with Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to protect aid workers after they targeted WCK. UN officials and aid workers, who have agreed to speak anonymously, told MEE that it had been clear for months that the humanitarian notification system in Gaza was broken.
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However, as it surfaced that the Israeli military killed seven aid workers, including six foreigners, in the WCK convoy on April 1, the world is now watching their flawed system, which they claim to aim to avoid dangerous misunderstandings and miscalculations based on ignorance as well as prevent accidents and conflict escalation.
Jamie McGoldrick, UN’s outgoing top aid official working in Gaza told reporters on Friday, his last day in the post, that aid organizations need a hotline to communicate directly with the Israeli military during emergencies and equipment such as two-way radios and satellite phones, items which are standard for aid workers in other conflicts, but not in Gaza where Israel fears Hamas could seize them.
“All we can do is keep pressing them for that,” McGoldrick said.
Most of the locations that were hit, 352, were locations run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), the largest aid organization operating in Gaza, including a food distribution center and schools sheltering thousands of civilians. MEE has counted five additional locations and convoys that were also hit, including a compound in Al-Mawasi housing staff working for the International Rescue Committee and Medical Aid for Palestine, the Gaza City offices of Doctors of the World, a Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) convoy in Gaza City and an MSF shelter in Al-Mawasi and an American Near East Refugee (ANERA) shelter in Deir al-Balah.
