This handout picture taken on March 11, 2024 by the Maghreb Arabe Presse shows humanitarian aid shipped from Morocco to the people in gaza being handled at the Israeli Ben Guiron Airport in Tel Aviv. (Photo by Maghreb Arabe Presse / AFP)
Morocco has sent 40 tonnes of humanitarian supplies for gaza, a diplomatic source said Tuesday, the latest bid to diversify aid routes into the war-battered territory.
The food aid has arrived at Ben Gurion airport near Tel Aviv before being transferred to the Palestinian Red Crescent at the Kerem Shalom crossing between Israel and gaza, the Moroccan diplomatic source told AFP on condition of anonymity.
This handout picture taken on March 11, 2024 by the Maghreb Arabe Presse shows members of the Moroccan Armed Royal Forces (FAR) standing next to humanitarian aid shipped from Morocco to the people in gaza and being handled at the Israeli Ben Guiron Airport in Tel Aviv. (Photo by Maghreb Arabe Presse / AFP)
Rabat's foreign ministry said in a statement that "Morocco is the first country to transport its humanitarian aid via this unprecedented land route".
The United Nations has repeatedly warned of looming famine in gaza, under an Israeli siege imposed in the wake of Hamas's October 7 attack that triggered the war, now in its sixth month.
Most aid enters through Rafah, but UN and other relief agencies say only a fraction of the supplies needed to sustain gaza's population of 2.4 million people has made it in.
