By Abdelraouf Arnaout
JERUSALEM (AA) - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday asked army chief Herzi Halevi to propose alternatives to the UN refugee agency for Palestinians (UNRWA) for providing and transferring aid to Gaza.
According to the Israeli public broadcaster KAN, Netanyahu asked Halevi to put plans not to rely on UNRWA in the near future with regard to all related issues of transferring humanitarian aid into Gaza.
KAN quoted senior officials who said Netanyahu asked Halevi to put his proposals on UNRWA's alternatives by the end of the week.
In recent days, Israel intensified its campaign against the UN agency, with Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz on Monday asking its chief Philippe Lazzarini to resign.
On Monday, the Israeli army also opened fire on an UNRWA aid convoy while heading for northern Gaza.
Since Jan. 26, several countries have suspended the agency's funding after Tel Aviv alleged that some of the agency's employees were involved in the cross-border attack on Israel on Oct. 7.
Israel has launched a deadly offensive on the Gaza Strip since an Oct. 7 attack by Hamas in which Tel Aviv says nearly 1,200 Israelis were killed.
At least 27,585 Palestinians have been killed and 66,978 others injured in Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip since Oct. 7, the Health Ministry in the enclave said on Tuesday.
The Israeli offensive has left 85% of Gaza’s population internally displaced 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.
*Writing by Ahmed Asmar in Ankara