The US government will not cut arms supplies to Israel, the State Department said after the deadline set by Washington for Israel to increase humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip has passed, DPA reported, quoted by BTA.
"We have not come to an assessment that they are violating American law,” said the spokesman of the diplomatic department, Vedant Patel, regarding Israel. "However, we will continue to monitor this space and pay close attention."
He said that over the past month, Israel has taken several steps in response to US requests for aid, but that additional measures are needed to make sustained progress.
Last month, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken wrote in a letter to senior Israeli officials that military support would be reviewed if humanitarian conditions in the Palestinian territories did not improve within the next 30 days.
A February White House memo, along with other US laws such as the Leahy Act, play a major role in this context. They allow the US to limit military aid if recipient countries obstruct humanitarian aid or fail to respect human rights guarantees. Application of the "Leahy" against a close ally like Israel would represent a serious turn in decades-long relations, DPA commented.
Human rights organizations and the United Nations say basic human rights standards are being violated in the Gaza Strip through the blockade of aid supplies, airstrikes on residential areas and the lack of protection for civilians.< /p>
The US stressed at the UN that "there should be no forced displacement nor a policy of starvation in Gaza“ on the part of Israel, warning that such a policy would have serious consequences under American and international law, reported Reuters, quoted by BTA.
The remarks by US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield came just hours after Washington said Israel was doing enough to deal with the humanitarian crisis in Gaza to avoid potential restrictions on US military aid.
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"However, Israel must ensure that its actions are fully implemented and that improvements are sustainable over time,” Thomas-Greenfield also told the UN Security Council.
She also added that there is an urgent need for Israel to suspend the implementation of a law banning the operation of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA).
The council is meeting on a report by world experts on hunger, which says there is a "high probability that famine is imminent in the areas" in northern Gaza as Israel conducts a military offensive against the Palestinian militant group "Hamas" in the area.
"Most of Gaza is now a wasteland of rubble”, acting head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, Joyce Msuya, told the Security Council.
"As I informed you, Israeli authorities are blocking humanitarian aid from entering northern Gaza, where fighting continues and some 75,000 people are left with dwindling supplies of water and food,” she said.
Israel's ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, dismissed the warning of world hunger experts as "simply bogus" and outlined Israel's efforts to improve the humanitarian situation in Gaza.