Jordan airdrops humanitarian aid to field hospital in Gaza Strip
Nov 12, 2023
Tel Aviv [Israel], November 12 : The Jordan Air Force has again dropped humanitarian aid from the air to a field hospital in the Gaza Strip, The Times of Israel reported.
The Jordanian army announced that the aid has been airdropped to a hospital operated by Amman in the Gaza Strip amid the crisis faced by Gazan civilians.
Reportedly, this is the second operation by Jordan in recent weeks and the packages were dropped from planes along with parachutes, The Times of Israel reported.
Earlier this week, Jordan airdropped medical aid into Gaza, bypassing Israel's tight embargo on aid entering the Strip.
Jordan King Abdullah posted on X (formerly Twitter) that the airdrop took place around Sunday midnight, with medical supplies and drugs being parachuted to a Jordanian field hospital in Gaza.
"Our fearless air force personnel air-dropped at midnight urgent medical aid to the Jordanian field hospital in Gaza. This is our duty to aid our brothers and sisters injured in the war in Gaza. We will always be there for our Palestinian brethren," King Abdullah stated.
Following Jordan's move to airdrop aid in Gaza, a US official said that it was coordinating with the US and Israel, according to The Times of Israel.
Israel has insisted on inspecting all aid entering the Strip via the Rafah crossing with Egypt, fearing that weapons or defensive equipment could be smuggled to the Hamas terror group.
Gazans and other rights groups have complained that the amount of aid is too paltry and the pace too slow to reach the Strip.
Jordanian envoy to India Mohamed Salam Jameel A.F. El-Kayed said, "Jordan's position is very clear for everybody. We call stopping the war right away. We call for a ceasefire to be put on to save the civilian casualties. We also stand for releasing all hostages. That's the Jordanian position that has been articulated by His Majesty King Abdullah II...and to stop the bombing of the civilian people. We've seen over 10,000 people have been killed, including children, women, elderly. So we need this war to be stopped right away..."
Three babies died in the neonatal unit of Al-Shifa Hospital located in northern Gaza after the hospital went "out of service" amid continuous Israeli fire in the vicinity, CNN reported quoting the Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health on Saturday.
It reported quoting Dr. Munir Al-Bursh, Director-General of the Hamas-controlled Ministry of Health that the doctors in the neonatal ward are now being forced to carry out artificial respiration by hand on the 36 babies that they are treating in the hospital.
Bursh also said the hospital was "surrounded from all four directions," estimating that 400 people were being treated at the hospital and around 20,000 displaced people seeking shelter in the hospital complex.