SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
The people of Gaza are starving. More than 2 million living there are facing chaos, starvation and death. That's according to more than 100 religious human rights and aid organizations who blame Israel's total siege of Gaza. Today, Israel's military says it is resuming airdrop aid. Meanwhile, hopes in Gaza for a temporary ceasefire have been dashed after the U.S. accused Hamas of negotiating in bad faith. NPR's Emily Feng is in Tel Aviv and is with us to explain the latest. Hi, Emily.
EMILY FENG, BYLINE: Hi, Scott.
DETROW: So let's start with this. Earlier this week on ALL THINGS CONSIDERED, Israel's ambassador to the United Nations pushed back against accusations that Israel is blocking aid trucks. Israel has blamed Hamas for diverting aid.
FENG: Yes, they've also blamed organizations like the United Nations for not being willing to deliver aid into Gaza. So here at NPR, we reached out to local and international aid organizations who say they have food trucks waiting on Gaza's borders to enter. The U.N. Food Programme said Israel frequently denies or rejects the multiple permissions they need to get their drivers into Gaza and to pick up aid in Gaza, and they want Israel's troops to stay away from aid routes because these troops keep firing on starving people trying to get the food.
Another aid organization, the International Rescue Committee, told NPR this week, they saw no evidence of systematic diversion of aid on the ground by Hamas when they were there. And instead, my colleagues, Aya Batrawy and also Anas Baba, who is in Gaza right now, have been reporting over the last few weeks that it is not Hamas but actually a new armed Palestinian gang, which Israel's prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has admitted to funding - that that gang has been stealing food from desperate civilians in Gaza.
DETROW: There's been significant global pressure for Israel to let in more food. Today, Israel says it is resuming airdrops. Yesterday, it said it was going to let in more trucks and aid and let countries like Jordan and the UAE airdrop, as well. Is this enough?
FENG: In short, no, Jordan and other countries tried airdrops last year, and these airdrops were often deadly themselves because these curtains of food dropped from planes, and they crushed people to death. Plus humanitarian organizations resoundingly say that airdrops are expensive, and they're insufficient given the high levels of hunger in Gaza.
These few weeks, though, Israel's mostly been letting food into Gaza through this U.S.- and Israeli-backed scheme called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, but hundreds of Palestinians have died from Israel gunfire at these Foundation food sites. One of their former contractors in Gaza is a former U.S. Special Forces officer named Anthony Aguilar, and he told the BBC just this week that he resigned from the Foundation because he alleges the Israeli military and American contractors explicitly targeted Palestinian civilians.
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ANTHONY AGUILAR: In my entire career have I never witnessed the level of brutality and use of indiscriminate and unnecessary force against a civilian population - an unarmed, starving population.
FENG: He says he saw Israeli tanks firing into crowds of civilians trying to leave the sites. The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation has said Aguilar's allegations are categorically false, and the Israeli military says it is examining the incidents he's described and issuing new instructions based on lessons learned.
DETROW: Look, Emily, we're hearing so many groups and countries and other organizations trying to frame what's happening in Gaza. What are the people who are in Gaza right now saying?
FENG: Just today, Gaza Health Authority said five people there have died of malnutrition. That brings a total up to more than 100 over the last few weeks. My colleague, Anas Baba, who is reporting still from Gaza, has been sending us interviews and videos and images of the people around him in Gaza who are weak, who are dizzy. Sometimes they're suddenly fainting from hunger. Adults can last through prolonged hunger for weeks, but it's young children under 3 years old who are very vulnerable. And as you're going to hear in a moment from Anas, some of these young children are now wasting away.
DETROW: That is NPR's Emily Feng from Tel Aviv. Thank you so much.
FENG: Thanks, Scott. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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