Fuel shipments should be allowed to enter the besieged Gaza Strip, the White House said Tuesday amid staunch Israeli opposition to any potential deliveries.
"Fuel is an important commodity for life and sustainment in Gaza for the Palestinian people that are still there. And we know that fuel is a precious commodity that's running out, and you need it for generator generators and hospitals. You need it to run the desalination pumps so that you can drink fresh water and that seawater. All of that is important," National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told reporters.
"We certainly understand Israeli concerns about the possibility for Hamas to abscond with fuel and use it for their own purposes, and not allow it to be used in hospitals and desalination plants. We understand that that is all a legitimate concern, no question about it," he added.
Despite the concerns, Kirby maintained that fuel "needs to be able to" reach Palestinians in Gaza.
There are sufficient supplies of fuel waiting to be loaded onto trucks and transported into Gaza via the Rafah border crossing with Egypt, but UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric demurred when asked why the UN has been unable to get the shipments into the occupied territory.
"I don't want to go into all the details. What I can tell you is that we want to get fuel in. We haven't been able to get all the hurdles moved for us to get that fuel in," he said.
UNRWA, the UN's Palestine refugee agency, warned Tuesday that aid operations will grind to a halt if it does not receive new shipments of fuel. Following the warning, Israel's military said it will not allow any fuel to reach Gaza.
"Fuel will not enter the Gaza Strip. Hamas needs it for its operational infrastructure," Israeli military spokesperson Daniel Hagari said in statements cited by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz.
Israel has continued a relentless bombardment campaign on the Gaza Strip following a cross-border attack by Hamas on Israeli border towns on Oct. 7 that killed 1,400 Israelis.
Nearly 5,800 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the bombardment began, including more than 2,000 children, according to the Gaza-based Health Ministry.
In addition to ongoing bombing, Israel ordered a "full siege" on Gaza, halting electricity supplies and prohibiting fuel, water and food from reaching Gaza.
The first aid shipment since Israel ordered the siege arrived Saturday with a second and third convoy of relief trucks entering Sunday and Monday.
The series of shipments, which constituted 54 aid trucks, entered from Egypt through the Rafah crossing, the sole route into Gaza not controlled by Israel.
Fuel is critical for Gaza's daily operations, and is needed to run water pump stations, a vital desalination plant to produce drinking water for the Strip's more than 2 million residents, as well as to keep the lights on in Gaza's over-burdened hospitals.
