CAIRO (AP) — The United Nations says it has suspended food distribution in the southern Gaza city of Rafah due to lack of supplies and insecurity. It also said no aid trucks entered in the past two days via a floating pier set up by the U.S. for sea deliveries.
The U.N. has not specified how many people remain in Rafah after the Israeli military launched an intensified assault there on May 6, but there appears to be several hundred thousand people.
Abeer Etefa, a spokesperson for the U.N’s World Food Program, warned that “humanitarian operations in Gaza are near collapse.” If food and other supplies don’t resume entering Gaza “in massive quantities, famine-like conditions will spread,” she said.
The warning came as Israel seeks to contain the fallout from a request by the chief prosecutor of the world’s top war crimes court for arrest warrants for Israeli and Hamas leaders, a move supported by three European countries, including key ally France. The prosecutor at the International Criminal Court cited Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for alleged “use of starvation as a method of warfare,” a charge they and other Israeli officials angrily deny. The prosecutor accused three Hamas leaders of war crimes over killings of civilians in the group’s Oct. 7 attack.
The crisis in humanitarian supplies has spiraled in the two weeks since Israel launched an incursion into Rafah on May 6, vowing to root out Hamas fighters. Troops seized the Rafah crossing into Egypt, which has been closed since. As of May 10, only about three dozen trucks made it into Gaza via the nearby Kerem Shalom crossing from Israel because fighting makes it difficult for aid workers to reach it, the U.N. says.
The main agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, announced the suspension of distribution in Rafah in a post on X, without elaborating beyond citing the lack of supplies.
Etefa said the WFP had also stopped distribution in Rafah after exhausting its stocks. It continues passing out hot meals in central Gaza and “limited distributions” of reduced food parcels in central Gaza, but “food parcel stocks will run out within days,” she said.
Etefa said 10 trucks entered through the U.S.-made pier on Friday and were taken to its warehouse in central Gaza. But a delivery Saturday of 11 trucks was stopped by crowds of Palestinians who took supplies, and only five trucks made it to the warehouse. No further deliveries came from the pier on Sunday or Monday, she said.
The U.N says some 1.1 million people in Gaza — nearly half the population — face catastrophic levels of hunger and that the territory is on the brink of famine.
Until early May, some 1.3 million people were crowded into Rafah after fleeing Israel’s offensive elsewhere in the territory. At least 810,000 of those have fled since Israel launched its incursion into the city. Those fleeing have scattered across southern Gaza, erecting sprawling tent camps or crowding into U.N. schools already heavily damaged from Israel’s previous offensives.
While no one faces imminent arrest from the ICC move, the announcement deepens Israel’s global isolation at a time when it is facing growing criticism from even its closest allies over the war in Gaza.
Belgium, Slovenia and France each said Monday they backed the decision by ICC prosecutor Karim Khan. Their support exposes divisions in the West’s approach to Israel.
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz headed to France on Tuesday in response, and his meetings there could set the tone for how countries navigate the warrants — if they are eventually issued — and whether they could pose a threat to Israeli leaders.
Israel still has the support of its top ally, the United States, as well as other Western countries that spoke out against the decision. But if the warrants are issued, they could complicate international travel for Netanyahu and Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, even if they do not face any immediate risk of prosecution because Israel itself is not a member of the court.
The prosecutor also requested warrants for Hamas leaders Yahya Sinwar, Mohammed Deif and Ismail Haniyeh. Hamas is already considered an international terrorist group by the West. Both Sinwar and Deif are believed to be hiding in Gaza. But Haniyeh, the supreme leader of the Islamic militant group, is based in Qatar and frequently travels across the region.
