US will continue aid drops into Gaza: White House

The United States will continue dropping essential aid from the air into the Gaza Strip, the White House said Tuesday after Palestinian group Hamas called for them to end following fatal drownings and stampedes.

"Air drops are one of the many ways that we are helping to provide desperately-needed aid to Palestinians in Gaza, and we will continue to do so," a spokesman for the National Security Council told reporters, after Hamas said that 18 people had died, 12 of them by drowning, while trying to recover dropped food supplies.