Middle-East

Arab League chief demands end to Gaza military operations

By AFP | Monday, October 16, 2023

Aboul Gheit said Israel's total siege of Gaza which has cut off water, food, electricity and fuel, was "depriving the Palestinians of their humanity and paving the way for ethnic cleansing".

The Arab League chief demanded Monday an end to military operations in the Gaza Strip and charged that the siege of the enclave is "depriving the Palestinians of their humanity".

"We demand the immediate end of military operations and the opening of safe corridors to bring aid to the population," Secretary-General Ahmed Aboul Gheit said during an Arab justice ministers meeting in Baghdad.

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Israel declared war on the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas a day after waves of its militants broke through Gaza's heavily fortified border on October 7, shooting, stabbing and burning to death more than 1,400 people.

Reeling from the deadliest attack in its history, Israel unleashed a relentless bombing campaign of the Gaza Strip that has flattened neighbourhoods and killed at least 2,750 people.

Aboul Gheit said Israel's total siege of Gaza which has cut off water, food, electricity and fuel, was "depriving the Palestinians of their humanity and paving the way for ethnic cleansing".

Meanwhile, Egypt and France's foreign ministers called for the delivery of humanitarian aid and the exit of foreign nationals from the bombarded Gaza Strip, on the tenth day of war between Israel and Hamas.

"Those who want to leave Gaza must be able to do so," French foreign minister Catherine Colonna said, urging the opening of crossing points.

Egypt controls the Rafah border crossing, the only passage in and out of Gaza not controlled by Israel.

A US official had told AFP Saturday that Egypt and Israel had reached an agreement for American citizens to leave through Rafah.

But Cairo's top diplomat Sameh Shoukry told reporters Monday that Egypt had "repeated its request to Israeli authorities for humanitarian aid to pass through".