(JNS) Israel has agreed to open the Kerem Shalom Crossing for inspection of trucks bearing humanitarian aid, to alleviate congestion at the Rafah border crossing with Egypt.
On Friday, Jake Sullivan, the US national security advisor, announced that his Israeli counterpart, Tzachi Hanegbi, told him on his trip to Israel this week that the Jewish state will open the Kerem Shalom crossing "for direct delivery of humanitarian assistance to Palestinian civilians in Gaza."
"We welcome this significant step," Sullivan said. "President Biden raised this issue in recent phone calls with Prime Minister Netanyahu, and it was an important topic of discussion during my visit to Israel over the past two days."
Sullivan said that Washington "remains committed to expanding and sustaining the flow of humanitarian assistance into Gaza" and "will continue to work closely with Egypt and other partners on the delivery and distribution of humanitarian assistance through Rafah crossing.
"We hope that this new opening will ease congestion and help facilitate the delivery of life-saving assistance to those who need it urgently in Gaza," he said.
"As part of the hostage release agreement, Israel committed to transfer 200 truckloads per day of food and humanitarian aid from Egypt for the civilian population in Gaza," the Israeli National Security Council announced on Friday. "The Rafah crossing has the capacity for only 100 trucks a day, with the Israeli security screening taking place at the Kerem Shalom crossing."
"Until today, these trucks were required to return to the Rafah crossing, causing heavy congestion and preventing the implementation of the agreement between Israel and the United States," it added. "In order to abide by the terms of the agreement, the cabinet approved today a temporary measure of unloading the trucks on the Gaza side of the Kerem Shalom crossing, instead of having them return to Rafah."
The cabinet decided only to allow humanitarian aid, which arrives from Egypt, to transfer to Gaza in this manner, the council stated. "The United States has committed to pay for the upgrade of the Rafah crossing as soon as possible to enable the transfer of humanitarian aid only via Rafah after passing Israeli security screening," it stated.
The Biden administration has also called on Israel repeatedly to decrease air strikes and to instead attack on the ground. Earlier in the week, a U.S. government spokesman said that Israel is "telegraphing" punches to Hamas in a way that he didn't think the U.S. military would, in order to avoid civilian casualties.
Opposition leader Avigdor Lieberman (Yisrael Beiteinu) criticized the decision to open the Kerem Shalom Crossing, which he called "shameful" and a "moral, political and security bankruptcy."
"The same crossing where the human monsters from Hamas massacred Israeli civilians, and through which essential goods and products were transported to the Gaza Strip for years," he wrote on social media, in Hebrew. "Opening the crossing is just like transferring Qatari money in cash to Yahya Sinwar and the other human monsters of Hamas."
"It is a continuation of the policy of surrendering to terrorism and the continuation of the Oslo Accords," he added. "I call on the government ministers to vote against the shameful vote."
