UN aid agency: Israel is holding up food for 1.1M Palestinians in Gaza

Israel has imposed financial restrictions on the main UN agency providing aid in Gaza, a measure which prevented a shipment of food for 1.1 million Palestinians from reaching the war-battered enclave, the agency's director said.

UNRWA's director, Philippe Lazzarini, said Friday that that a convoy of food donated by Türkiye has been sitting for weeks in the Israeli port city of Ashdod. The agency said that the Israeli contractor they work with received a call from Israeli customs authorities “ordering them not to process any UNRWA goods.”

That stoppage means 1,049 shipping containers of rice, flour, chickpeas, sugar and cooking oil — enough to feed 1.1 million people for one month — are stuck, even as an estimated 25 percent of families in Gaza face catastrophic hunger.

The World Food Program warned Friday that Gaza could be plunged into famine as early as May. The UN food agency defines a famine as when 30 percent of children are malnourished, one-fifth of households face acute food shortages and two of every 10,000 people are dying from hunger or malnutrition.

The Israeli aggression has led to a humanitarian crisis in Gaza, with only a trickle of humanitarian aid entering the territory each day.

Israel has long railed against UNRWA, accusing it of tolerating or even collaborating with Hamas and perpetuating the 76-year-old Palestinian refugee crisis. UNRWA, which serves about 6 million Palestinians whose families were displaced in 1948, denies the charges.

UNWRA's bank account frozen

Juliette Touma, communications director for the agency, said that UNWRA's bank account with Bank Leumi, which the agency has held for decades, was also frozen this week. In addition, Touma said that Israeli customs authorities notified the agency that UNRWA will no longer be granted tax exemptions.

Israel's finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, tweeted on Thursday that “the state of Israel will not give tax benefits to terrorist aides.”

Smotrich, a far-right ally of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, didn't respond to a request for comment.

The agency has been able to reroute other aid shipments through Port Said in Egypt, but Lazzarini warned Friday that the holdup means further difficulties in the already challenging task of aid distribution to Gaza. About 80 percent of Gaza's 2.3 million people have been displaced by the war.

UNWRA is the main provider of aid to Palestinians in Gaza, but Israeli bombardment in Gaza has made much of the territory too dangerous for aid convoys to cross. The agency has been unable to deliver aid to around 300,000 Palestinians estimated to still be in the northern half of Gaza, where the World Food Program says food insecurity is the worst.