At least 18 Palestinians have been killed in the northern Gaza Strip in recent hours as dozens of people “hungry” they entered the sea to pick up humanitarian aid packages dropped from the air. Twelve of them have died from drowning and six from asphyxiation. due to the stampede, the Strip’s Health Ministry, controlled by Hamas, reported.

“Air delivery of aid has become a real danger to life of hungry citizens,” he denounced. It is not the first time that the launch of packages by air claims the lives of Gazan civilians, since the past March 4, five civilians died and several were injured by the impact of the pallets of humanitarian aid after the parachutes did not open in Gaza City.

In this situation, The Palestinian authorities call for an end to this type of “useless, offensive and inappropriate” operations and asks Israel to open “immediately“the rest of the land border crossings – there are five unopened – to alleviate the “serious” food shortage suffered by civilians in northern Gaza for the sixth consecutive month.

Israel, for its part, insists that the problem of humanitarian aid will not be resolved with the opening of more border crossings and blames the UN for not distributing the packages that enter through the two land crossings active since the outbreak of the war: Kerem Shalom, in Israeli territory, and Rafah, on the border with Egypt.

Children die of hunger in Gaza

And although Israel in recent weeks has allowed the entry of convoys on two occasions on a new route that goes directly to the north of the Strip, this Monday prevented the entry of convoys from the United Nations Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA in English), whom it accuses of having links with the Hamas group.

The airdrop of humanitarian aid swas put on the table a few weeks ago by the international community, andbetween them Jordan, France, Egypt or the United Statesas an alternative to deliver more aid to the north of the Strip where 300,000 Gazans are exposed to famine.

“We hold the US administration, the international community and the Israeli occupation fully responsible for the continuation of these combined crimes, which the world has been unable to stop,” the Gaza ministry criticizes in its statement.. At least 23 boys and girls have died from dehydration and malnutrition in the northern Gaza Strip, according to the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF)