MARCH 5, 2024 – The Defense Department is planning for potential additional humanitarian aid missions in Gaza following an initial airdrop of aid over the weekend.
On Saturday, Air Force C-130 Hercules aircraft attached to U.S Central Command partnered with Royal Jordanian Air Force C-130s to drop over 38,000 meals ready-to-eat to civilians along the Gaza coastline.
“These airdrops are part of a sustained effort to get more aid into Gaza, including by expanding flow of aid through land corridors and routes,” Deputy Pentagon Press Secretary Sabrina Singh told reporters during a meeting today with the Pentagon press corps.
On the topic of land corridors, Singh noted that between 30 and 120 trucks carrying aid have been able to enter Gaza daily over the past week, and Saturday’s airdrops served as a “supplemental” effort to reach Palestinian civilians.
“It’s certainly a priority of this administration to not only open those humanitarian corridors and allow aid to flow,” said Singh, “but to [also] make sure the [aid] is getting to the people who need it the most.”
In addressing a video posted to social media of some airborne pallets of aid landing in water off the Gaza coastline, Singh said the DOD believes those MREs — the contents of which she stated were culturally sensitive, from a dietary standpoint — were able to be successfully obtained by the Palestinians.
While acknowledging that one drop of 66 bundles totaling 38,000 meals isn’t enough to feed all the population of Gaza, Singh emphasized that DOD is continuing to work to provide more aid.
“We’re doing everything possible that we can [to] get food into the region, by all means necessary,” she said.
The airdrop, which the U.S. and Jordan coordinated with Israel ahead of time, followed an announcement by President Joe Biden one day prior that the U.S. would begin delivering aid to Gaza in response to deteriorating humanitarian conditions as a result of the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas.
By Matthew Olay , DOD News