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 Rafah crossing has the capacity for only 100 trucks a day, with the Israeli security screening taking place at the Kerem Shalom crossing.

Until Saturday, these trucks were required to return to the Rafah crossing, causing heavy congestion and preventing the implementation of the Hostage release agreement between Israel and the United States.

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’s decision determines that only humanitarian aid arriving from Egypt will be transferred into the Gaza Strip this way.

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.

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Image: By Oleg Yunakov – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=140971433

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