The Israeli military announced on Sunday a “tactical pause” during the day in several areas Southern Gaza to clear the backlog of humanitarian aid shipments destined for desperate Palestinians suffering from a humanitarian crisis caused by the war with Hamas.
The daily pause announced by the military applies to about 7.4 miles of roads in the Rafah area. However, the battle in the town of Rafah, where Israel is targeting the remaining militant brigades of Hamas, will continue, the military said.
The army said the pause would begin at 8 a.m. local time (0500 GMT) and remain in effect until 7 p.m. local time (1600 GMT). He said rest will be taken daily until further notice.
The pause was intended to allow aid trucks to reach the Israeli-held Kerem Shalom crossing, the main entry point for incoming aid, and travel safely to the Salah a-Din highway, the main north-south road, the military said. The crossing has been experiencing congestion since Israeli ground forces moved into Rafah in early May.
The pause falls short of a complete ceasefire in the beleaguered region that the international community, including Israel’s main ally, the United States, has sought.
If it continues, the limited halt in fighting could help address some of the overwhelming Palestinian needs of the past few weeks as the war, now in its ninth month, continues.
COGAT, the Israeli military body that oversees aid distribution in Gaza, said the route would increase the flow of aid to other areas of Gaza, including Khan Younis, Muwasi and central Gaza. Hardline northern Gaza, which was an early target of the war, is served by goods coming in from the crossings in the north.
The military said Sunday’s pause, which began as Muslims in Gaza and elsewhere began marking the Eid al-Adha holiday, followed discussions with the UN and international aid agencies.
After criticism of ultranationalist moves in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, which opposes an end to the war, the military said the war had not been halted in the rest of the southern Gaza Strip and there had been no change in aid flows in general.
The break along the southern route came as Israel and Hamas consider the latest proposal for a ceasefire, the plan detailed by President Biden in the most concentrated diplomatic administration to end the fighting and free the hostages taken by militant groups. While Biden described the proposal as Israeli, Israel has not fully accepted it and Hamas is demanding changes that Israel does not seem to accept.
The fighting continues unabated, and Israel announced on Sunday the names of a total of 11 soldiers killed in a fresh attack on Gaza, including one who died of wounds sustained in last week’s attack. That brings the number of soldiers killed since Israel began its ground invasion of Gaza last year to 308. Hamas killed 1,200 people in the Oct. 7 attack that started the war and took 250 hostages, Israeli authorities said. Health officials in Hamas-run Gaza say more than 37,000 Palestinians have been killed in the fighting.
Israel’s eight-month military offensive against Hamas, triggered by the militant group’s October 7 attack, has plunged Gaza into a humanitarian crisis, with the UN reporting widespread hunger and hundreds of thousands of people on the brink of starvation.
Aid flows to southern Gaza are slowing as humanitarian needs grow. More than 1 million Palestinians, many of whom have been displaced, fled Rafah after the invasion, pouring into other areas of southern and central Gaza. Most now languish in ramshackle tents, using trenches as latrines, with open sewage in the streets.
COGAT said there is no restriction on the entry of trucks. It said more than 8,600 trucks of all types, aid and commercial, entered Gaza from all crossings from May 2 to June 13, an average of 201 per day. But much of that aid has piled up at crossroads and never reached its final destination.
A spokesman for COGAT, Shimon Freedman, said it was the UN’s fault that the cargo was piled up on the Gaza side of Kerem Shalom. He said the agency has “fundamental logistical problems that haven’t been addressed,” particularly truck shortages.
The UN denies the allegations. He said the war between Israel and Hamas often made it too dangerous for UN trucks in Gaza to travel to Kerem Shalom, which is next to the Israeli border.
It also said delivery speeds have slowed because the Israeli military must authorize drivers to travel to the site, a system Israel says is designed for driver safety. Due to the lack of security, aid trucks were in some cases also looted by mobs as they moved through the streets of Gaza.
The new arrangement aims to reduce the need to coordinate deliveries by providing an uninterrupted window of 11 hours per day for trucks to enter and exit the intersection.
It was not immediately clear whether the army would provide security to protect the aid trucks as they moved on the highway.
Meanwhile, a temporary offshore dock designed to bring in much-needed humanitarian aid temporarily dismantled – for the second time – because the sea is rough.
US Central Command announced that US-built docks thrown off the coast of Gaza and towed back to Ashdod, Israel, to avoid destruction. The pier will be “reconnected as soon as possible” once water conditions calm down, CENTCOM said, but did not give an estimate of when.