LIMASSOL, Cyprus (AP) — A ship that set off from Cyprus loaded with 1,200 tons of food supplies for the Gaza Strip is approaching the Israeli port of Ashdod on Tuesday in a renewed effort to alleviate the worsening crisis in the Palestinian territory, where food security experts say the “worst-case scenario of famine” is unfolding.
The Panamanian-flagged vessel is loaded with 52 containers carrying food aid such as pasta, rice, baby food and canned goods. Israeli customs officials had screened the aid at the Cypriot port of Limassol, from where the ship departed on Monday.
Some 700 tons of the aid is from Cyprus, purchased with money donated by the United Arab Emirates to the so-called Amalthea Fund, set up last year for donors to help with seaborne aid. The rest comes from Italy, the Maltese government, a Catholic religious order in Malta and the Kuwaiti nongovernmental organization Al Salam Association.
“The situation is beyond dire,” Cyprus Foreign Minister Constantinos Kombos told The Associated Press.
Cyprus was the staging area last year for 22,000 tons of aid deliveries by ship directly to Gaza through a pier operated by the international charity World Central Kitchen and a U.S. military-run docking facility known as the Joint Logistics Over-the-Shore system.
By late July 2024, aid groups pulled out of the project, ending a mission plagued by repeated weather and security problems that limited how much food and other emergency supplies could get to those in need.
Cypriot Foreign Ministry said Tuesday's mission is led by the United Nations but is a coordinated effort — once offloaded at Ashdod, U.N. employees would arrange for the aid to be trucked to storage areas and food stations operated by the World Central Kitchen.
The charity, which was behind the first aid shipment to Gaza from Cyprus last year aboard a tug-towed barge, is widely trusted in the battered territory.
“The contribution of everyone involved is crucial and their commitment incredible,” Kombos said.
Shipborne deliveries can bring much larger quantities of aid than the air drops that several nations have recently made in Gaza.
United Nations Office for Operations Chief Jorge Moreira da Silva called Tuesday's shipment a “crucial step in alleviating suffering in Gaza.”
“We need rapid, unhindered and safe flow of humanitarian aid for all civilians in need,” he posted on X.
The latest shipment comes a day after Hamas said it has accepted a new proposal from Arab mediators for a ceasefire. Israel has not approved the latest proposal so far.
Israel announced plans to reoccupy Gaza City and other heavily populated areas after ceasefire talks stalled last month, raising the possibility of a worsening humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza, which experts say is sliding into famine.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has dismissed reports of starvation in Gaza as “lies” promoted by Hamas. But the U.N. last week warned that starvation and malnutrition in the Palestinian territory are at their highest levels since the war began with the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, in which the militants abducted 251 people and killed around 1,200, mostly civilians.
Gaza’s Health Ministry, which is part of the Hamas-run government and staffed by medical professionals, said the Palestinian death toll from 22 months of war has passed 62,000. It does not say how many were civilians or combatants, but says women and children make up around half the dead. The United Nations and other independent experts view its figures as the most reliable count of casualties.
Menelaos Hadjicostis, The Associated Press
