The Turkish Red Crescent (Kızılay) is set to dispatch an aid ship to Gaza after the upcoming Eid al-Fitr, also known as Ramadan Bayram, marking its ninth shipment so far, Chairperson Fatma Meriç Yılmaz announced Saturday.
“We have begun loading a new round of humanitarian aid supplies for Gaza,” Yılmaz said on X, posting pictures of Red Crescent personnel stacking some 3,000 tons of aid into the cargo vessel Marin at the Port of Mersin in southern Türkiye.
Marin, laden with urgently needed materials such as food, clothing, hygiene and baby supplies, shelter and medical products, is expected to set sail right after Eid al-Fitr ends on April 12.
“These aid materials you have entrusted us with are now critical for Gaza’s civilians,” Yılmaz said. “Especially women and children are at grave risk in the city where electricity, food and clean water have run out.”
The Turkish Red Crescent deployed its largest aid shipment of the year to besieged Gaza early in March in time for Ramadan, delivering over 2,700 tons of aid, including food parcels containing ready-to-eat meals, water, food packages, flour, clothing, hygiene kits, shelter materials such as tents, sleeping bags and blankets, medical equipment and baby supplies.
The aid agency is coordinating with the Egyptian Red Crescent and the Palestinian Red Crescent to ensure that the aid trucks reach the needy recipients quickly.
In addition to distributing food packages within Gaza, the Turkish Red Crescent continues providing hot meals to 5,000 people daily by running a soup kitchen in Rafah, southern Gaza.
During Ramadan, its staff on the ground hand out meals at sahur and iftar, the sunrise and sunset meals for Ramadan eaten before and after the daily fast.
Türkiye, which has denounced Israel for its offensive in densely populated Gaza and called for an immediate cease-fire, has sent tens of thousands of humanitarian aid items there since the start of the Israeli war on Gaza on Oct. 7.
Under the coordination of its disaster management agency and with the support of civil society organizations, the country has sent 13 planes and eight ships carrying humanitarian aid supplies to the Palestinian people. With the combined efforts of ship voyages, air bridge operations, local procurement and cooperation with the U.N. Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), the total humanitarian aid has reached 39,607 tons.
To meet the water needs of civilians in the Gaza Strip, another project was launched in collaboration with the Egyptian Red Crescent to supply bottled water. So far, 1,126 tons of water have been delivered to the region through weekly shipments of five trucks.
Israel has waged a deadly military offensive on the Gaza Strip since Oct. 7, 2023, when a cross-border attack led by the Palestinian group Hamas was launched, in which some 1,200 people were killed.
Nearly 33,200 Palestinians, mostly women and children, have since been killed, causing mass destruction, displacement and shortages of necessities. The crippling Israeli blockade also does not let in enough aid for the enclave’s population of over 2 million, leaving Palestinians there vulnerable to famine and disease.
Israel stands accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice (ICJ), which last week asked it to do more to prevent famine in Gaza.
The U.N. court, in an interim ruling in January, also ordered Tel Aviv to stop genocidal acts and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians in Gaza.
Egypt, Qatar and the U.S. have sought to broker a truce between Israel and Hamas before the start of Ramadan, but to no avail. Israeli airstrikes continued across Gaza, killing and injuring hundreds throughout the holy month.
Türkiye has been a virulent critic of Israel since the start of the war and a staunch defender of the Palestinian cause, including holding talks with Palestinian, Israeli and Hamas officials.
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