"As we speak, at least 1 million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, half of them children, are starving, not because of a natural disaster or because of lack of generous assistance waiting at the border," Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki told a UN event to mark the 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on Tuesday.
Al-Maliki accused Israel of using starvation as a weapon of war against around 1 million people in Gaza and condemned the "international failure" to respect Palestinians' rights at a UN meeting in Geneva.
The UN World Food Programme says half of Gaza's population of 2.3 million is starving as the expansion of Israel's military campaign into the southern part of the Gaza Strip, in response to the October 7 massacre carried out by Hamas terrorists, has cut people off from food, medicine, and fuel.
Israel will open Kerem Shalom crossing for aid
Israel has said it allows aid into Gaza via the Rafah crossing and has signaled that the Kerem Shalom crossing could soon reopen to help process aid deliveries.
Beginning tomorrow, Kerem Shalom Crossing will open for security checks on aid shipments from Al-Arish. The simultaneous security checks at Kerem Shalom and Nitzana crossings will DOUBLE the volume of aid delivered through the Rafah Crossing and admitted into the Gaza Strip. pic.twitter.com/76CYsaSIT4
— COGAT (@cogatonline) December 11, 2023
In remarks to reporters shortly afterward, made alongside the mother of American-Israeli hostage Hersh Goldberg Polin, Israeli UN ambassador Meirav Eilon Shahar criticized al-Maliki's address for making no mention of Hamas and its deadly attacks on Israel.
"Nothing about October 7, nothing about the atrocities that were committed by Hamas," she said.
At the same event, Iran's Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian said that Israel and the United States would never be able to eliminate Hamas and that Israel could only secure the liberation of its hostages through a political solution to the conflict.