The failure of the United Nations to get aid to Gaza past Hamas and into the hands of suffering civilians is leading to increasing calls in Israel to end humanitarian assistance altogether. 

Hamas’s takeover of aid distribution helps the terror organization maintain its hold on power, and thus prolong the war. As President-elect Trump’s inauguration nears, Jeruslaem is hoping it will have more leeway to control the war strategy than it has with President Biden in the White House.  

While Israel each day facilitates the entry into Gaza of some 200 aid trucks, much of their cargo never reaches the needy. In many cases, Hamas and other gangs confiscate it. The armed looters then distribute the goods to clan leaders who pledge young recruits to fight on behalf of Hamas. That way, the terrorist organization secures its hold on Gaza, and ensures that its war on Israel will continue.     

“We need to make a deal to release the hostages and end the war,” a Knesset member of the left-of-center opposition Yesh Atid party, Meirav Cohen, told Channel 12 television Thursday. “Then, if Hamas refuses to sign such a deal, we must completely cut off all aid to Gaza.”

By doing so, though, Israel would “commit a war crime, and would surely be taken to the Hague,” a United Nations official tells the Sun. Yet, the International  Court of Justice is already weighing an accusation of Israeli “genocide,” while the Interational Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants targeting top Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Netanayhu.

In both cases, the allegations largely rely on reports, including from UN officials, that accuse Israel of blocking food, medicine, and other necessities from getting to Gaza. These reports dismiss the fact that Israel facilitates the entry of large quantities of aid, while the UN struggles to distribute it.

“There are currently approximately 800 trucks worth of aid waiting to be collected from the Gazan side of the Kerem Shalom Crossing,” the Israel Defense Force’s aid coordination unit, known as Cogat, writes on X. Other organizations collect and distribute aid, Cogat says, and “so should, and could, the UN.”

It isn’t all that simple, a spokesman for Secretary-General Guterres, Farhan Haq, tells the Sun. “Getting aid in doesn’t simply mean dumping them off at a point, but ensuring that they can get there safely.” He blamed “huge amounts of anarchy” in Gaza, “lack of safety for drivers,” and lack of safety in terms of goods being looted. 

Even some UN officials are criticizing Mr. Guterres, who insists that the lead on aid distribution should be assumed by the UN Relief and Works Agency, which Israel accuses of having been co-opted by Hamas. “Why are we fighting Israel on this? We should let our other agencies take charge of distribution,” one UN official tells the Sun.

Unrwa “is the backbone of our humanitarian operations in Gaza,” Mr. Haq counters. “We depend on them in a way that no other organization can possibly replace.”

Israelis are unconvinced. In the past three months, the World Food Program has been responsible for 50 percent of humanitarian aid in Gaza, while Unrwa has accounted for less than 13 percent, the Israeli ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, writes. 

In an op-ed for the Fox News website, Mr. Danon details Unrwa officials’ involvement in Hamas terrorism activities, its teachers’ incitement against Israel, and its sheltering of Hamas military capabilities. Unrwa officials also participated in the kidnapping of Israelis on October 7, 2023. “It is time for the UN to dissolve Unrwa and stop being collaborators in conflict to start being partners in peace,” he writes.   

A law that passed the Knesset in October would end all Israeli cooperation with Unrwa by January 30. Such a move would likely be condemned globally, including in some quarters at Washington. As Trump’s presidency begins, though, Israelis are hoping for a wholesale change in the dynamics surrounding the Gaza war’s end-game.  

Following the November election, optimistic reports cited “significant progress” in diplomatic contacts to end the war under the Biden administration’s auspices. A deal for a partial release of some hostages in return for weeks of cease-fire in Gaza, though, now seems less likely.

Hamas refuses to deliver a list of hostages to be released, as it claims it can’t locate their whereabouts inside Gaza. Israel is reportedly insisting that if Hamas remains in power, the IDF could resume military activities following the proscribed weeks of cease-fire. 

Trump has said that if the hostages are not released by January 20, “there will be all hell to pay in the Middle East and for those in charge who perpetrated these atrocities against humanity.”

The Biden administration has long leaned on Israel to increase humanitarian aid to Gaza, including by threatening to withhold American arms deliveries if Jeruslaem refuses to do so. “Trump will not exert such pressure,” a senior Channel 12 analyst, Amit Segal, said Thursday. “If Israel decides to end all deliveries to Gaza, you won’t hear a peep from Trump,” he said.