LONDON

Humanitarian aid delivery into Gaza "must resume immediately and should never be politicized," the EU foreign policy chief told the Israeli foreign minister on Tuesday.

In a phone call, Kaja Kallas told Gideon Sa'ar that the humanitarian situation in Gaza is "untenable."

"Humanitarian aid must resume immediately and should never be politicised. The new aid delivery mechanism should run through humanitarian actors," she wrote on X.

Nearly 2.4 million people in Gaza live completely dependent on humanitarian aid, according to World Bank data.

Since March 2, Israel has kept Gaza’s crossings closed to food, medical, and humanitarian aid, deepening an already humanitarian crisis in the enclave, according to government, human rights, and international reports.

Figures released by Gaza’s government media office showed that at least 57 Palestinians have died of starvation since October 2023.

More than 52,600 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza in a brutal Israeli onslaught since October 2023, most of them women and children.

The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants in November for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.

The new Israeli plan is said to involve international organizations and private security contractors to hand out boxes of food to individual families in Gaza.