By Ahmet Gencturk
ATHENS (AA) – The EU foreign policy chief said on Monday that before the outbreak of the current Mideast conflict, the great powers had forgotten about the Palestinian issue.
Speaking to the press after arriving at a meeting of the EU’s Foreign Affairs Council in Brussels, Josep Borrell said: “The peace process has been forgotten for too long. The great powers have forgotten about the Palestinian issue thinking that it was going to be solved alone or that it does not matter – yes, it matters.”
“Yes, we have to continue working on that. We launched this initiative (Peace Day Effort) during the UN General Assembly. Now there’s for sure the need, it has to be upgraded, and we will start discussing about that,” he added.
Borrell added that Hamas should release all the hostages it is holding and stop firing rockets from Gaza into Israel for de-escalation.
“But the priority at the moment is to make humanitarian support go into Gaza,” he said.
When asked who is the main obstacle to letting humanitarian aid into Gaza, Borrell replied: “In that moment, Egypt is ready to let all the trucks which are queuing enter. I do not want to put the blame on anyone, but the fact is that they are not entering.”
The initial aid trucks entered Gaza after lengthy negotiations with Israel, which wants to subject all the trucks to a lengthy inspection and to limit the number of trucks to a fraction of what used to arrive before the conflict.
The conflict in Gaza, under Israeli bombardment since Oct. 7, began when Hamas initiated Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, a multi-pronged surprise attack that included a barrage of rocket launches and infiltrations into Israel by land, sea, and air. It said the incursion was in retaliation for the storming of the Al-Aqsa Mosque and growing violence by Israeli settlers.
The Israeli military then launched Operation Swords of Iron against Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip.
The Israeli army continues to target Gaza with intensive airstrikes that have destroyed entire neighborhoods, killing 5,087 Palestinians, including 2,055 children and 1,119 women, and injuring 15,273, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
An unknown number of people are also trapped under the rubble.