France starts dropping aid into Gaza

France dropped aid into conflict-torn Gaza on the weekend, and urged Israel to give humanitarian agencies and governments more access to the territory in the face of a growing starvation crisis there.

The nation's air-dropped aid began to rain down on the people of Gaza on Friday, with Paris saying it would deliver 40 metric tons of humanitarian aid in the following hours in the hope of mitigating the risk of famine.

As the aid started to arrive, France's President Emmanuel Macron wrote on the X social media platform: "Faced with the absolute urgency, we have just conducted a food airdrop operation in Gaza. Thank you to our Jordanian, Emirati, and German partners for their support, and to our military personnel for their commitment. Airdrops are not enough. Israel must open full humanitarian access to address the risk of famine."

Earlier, France's Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot told the France Info public broadcaster the country planned to complete four drops using planes sent via Jordan.

France's direct action followed the United Nations' hunger monitoring agency saying last week that a famine scenario was unfolding in the Gaza Strip after nearly two years of conflict between Israel and the Hamas organization.

Macron's office said a lot more aid could flow into the Gaza Strip if the Israeli authorities removed impediments it had put in the way.

The French aid drop included food and other supplies, but France said it will do little to prevent the risk of starvation among Gaza's 2 million residents.

Paris has also said it intends to formally recognize a Palestinian state in the coming weeks, a move that has been mirrored by the governments of the United Kingdom and Canada. The moves are being seen by many as attempts to put pressure on Israel, which is a traditional ally of France, the UK, and Canada, in order to get it to allow more aid to be distributed.

Gaza has been largely cut off from the outside world ever since Hamas-led attacks on Israel on Oct 7, 2023 that killed 1,200 people led to the ongoing conflict in Gaza that had killed almost 61,000 people as of July 30, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.

While critics have claimed Israel is using starvation tactics to try to force the people of Gaza to disassociate themselves with Hamas, Israel's consul general in New York, Ofir Akunis, told Newsweek magazine: "There is no deliberate starvation in Gaza, only a deliberate disinformation campaign orchestrated by Hamas and amplified by those who fail to act."

The Israel Defense Forces said recently it has introduced a daily "tactical pause in military activity" to allow UN aid shipments to be brought in to parts of the Gaza Strip by road.