By Hassan Jebril
ALGIERS (AA) – Algeria will dispatch 150 tons of humanitarian aid to the besieged Gaza Strip amid a deadly Israeli offensive on the Palestinian enclave, the Algerian Red Crescent Society said Sunday.
The aid will be transported aboard eight military aircraft from Blida, south of the capital Algiers, to Egypt’s El-Arish Airport near the Gaza Strip, the society said in a statement.
The aid shipments “reflect Algeria’s commitment to unconditional and unlimited solidarity with the Palestinian people, who are facing a non-stop aggression, particularly in the Gaza Strip, by the occupying forces under an unjust siege,” it added.
Algeria launched an airlift to the El-Arish Airport last October to send urgent humanitarian aid to the Palestinian enclave.
Israel has waged a deadly military offensive on the Palestinian territory since a cross-border attack led by the Palestinian group Hamas in which some 1,200 Israelis were killed.
More than 32,200 Palestinians have since been killed and over 74,500 injured amid mass destruction and shortages of necessities.
Israel has also imposed a crippling blockade on the Gaza Strip, leaving its population, particularly residents of northern Gaza, on the verge of starvation.
The Israeli war has pushed 85% of Gaza’s population into internal displacement amid acute shortages of food, clean water, and medicine, while 60% of the enclave's infrastructure has been damaged or destroyed, according to the UN.
Israel is accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice. An interim ruling in January ordered Tel Aviv to stop genocidal acts and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians in Gaza.
*Writing by Rania Abu Shamala