War in the Middle East
Air Force drops first aid supplies over Gaza Strip
A plane drops humanitarian aid over the northern Gaza Strip. (Archive) Photo
© Tsafrir Abayov/AP/dpa
The situation of the civilian population in the Gaza Strip is desperate. Now Germany is also participating with aid deliveries that are dropped on parachutes from transport aircraft.
The Luftwaffe has its relief mission over the embattled area Gaza Strip started. According to information from the German Press Agency, the first relief supplies were dropped on parachutes from a transport plane on Saturday. The Bundeswehr had relocated two C-130 Hercules transport aircraft stationed in France to the region to take part. Each machine can transport up to 18 tons of load.
The aircraft are deployed from Jordan. With this operation, the Bundeswehr is taking part in the airlift for Gaza, which was initiated by the Arab country. Other partners such as the USA and France are also taking part in the initiative.
Aid organizations describe the situation of the people in the Gaza Strip as increasingly desperate. The situation cannot therefore be sufficiently improved by load shedding alone. According to the UN, there is a risk of a hunger crisis in the coastal strip if aid deliveries by truck are not increased. There is now criticism of the Israeli military’s actions from many countries. The federal government had appealed to Israel to improve the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip. Around 2.2 million people live in the coastal area.
“Gravity settling”
“The people in Gaza lack the bare necessities. We want to do our part to ensure that they have access to food and medicine,” said Defense Minister Boris Pistorius (SPD).
The Air Force itself describes the process as “gravity dropping,” in which goods leave the aircraft rolling over the loading ramp on a pallet and fall to the ground hanging from parachutes. Technically, the method differs from so-called dropping, in which loads fall to the ground without braking.
The Gaza war was triggered by the worst massacre in Israel’s history, which was carried out in Israel on October 7th by terrorists from the Islamist Hamas and other extremist Palestinian organizations. On the Israeli side, more than 1,200 people were killed. Israel responded with massive air strikes and a ground offensive in the Gaza Strip. On the Palestinian side, more than 31,100 people have been killed since the war began, according to the Hamas-controlled health authority.