‘No reason for gram of food or aid to enter Gaza’: Israel’s Ben-Gvir

JERUSALEM / ANKARA

Far-right Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir called Wednesday for preventing the entry of “a gram of food or aid” into the blockaded Gaza Strip as Tel Aviv continued its brutal onslaught on the enclave.

“It’s a shame we don’t learn from our mistakes. As long as our hostages are dying in the tunnels, there is no reason for a gram of food or aid to enter Gaza,” Ben-Gvir writes on X.

He claimed that allowing aid into Gaza would harm Israel’s ability “to defeat Hamas and return our hostages safely.”

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said early Wednesday that Tel Aviv’s policy is to block the entry of aid into Gaza “as one of the main pressure levers preventing Hamas from using it as a tool with the population.”

Since March 2, Israel has closed Gaza’s crossings, blocking essential supplies from entering the enclave despite multiple reports of famine in the war-devastated territory.

The Israeli army renewed a deadly assault on Gaza on March 18, shattering a ceasefire and prisoner exchange agreement that took hold in January.

Over 51,000 Palestinians, most of them women and children, have been killed in Gaza in a brutal Israeli onslaught since October 2023.

The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants last November for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.