The president of United States, Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will speak by phone this Thursdayjust days after the attack that killed seven World Central Kitchen (WCK) collaborators, a US official informed Efe.
It will be the first phone call between the two leaders since March 18 and comes at a time of special tension due to the Israeli attack in the Gaza Strip against the organization founded in 2010 by the Spanish chef José Andrés to provide food in the face of natural disasters and wars.
The destroyed car of the NGO World Central Kitchen (WCK).
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According to the White House, Biden is “heartbroken” by the attack, but His Government has not modified the support it has given to Israel since the beginning of the conflict in Gaza after the attack by the armed wing of Hamas on October 7 against Israeli territory.
In fact, the Administration is about to approve the sale of up to 50 US-made F-15 fighters to Israel, in a deal valued at more than $18 billion, according to local media citing sources familiar with the matter.
On Tuesday, the day of the attack, Biden spoke by phone with José Andrés to convey his condolences for the death of members of his NGO, one of them a US national.
In an op-ed published Wednesday in The New York Times, José Andrés affirmed that the deaths of humanitarian workers were the “direct result” of Israeli policy in his war with Hamas.
The chef stated that the seven victims “were the best of humanity,” with a face and a name, “not just generic humanitarian workers or collateral damage.”
Body of a worker from the NGO World Central Kitchen.
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The seven humanitarian workers are the Palestinian Saifeddin Issam Ayad Abutaha, the Australian Lalzawmi Frankcom, the Polish Damian Soból, the Canadian-American Jacob Flickinger and the British John Chapman, James Henderson and James Kirby, “who risked everything for the most fundamental activity human: sharing our food with others,” Andrés stressed.
In the article, chef asks Israel to open more land routes to deliver food and medicine –a demand that humanitarian agencies have been making for months so that aid reaches the north, where famine is already a reality -, “stop killing civilians and humanitarian workers” and “start the long road to peace today.”
Netanyahu admitted Israel's responsibility for the “unintentional” attack that killed the workers, and Israeli President Isaac Herzog called José Andrés to apologize for the incident.
According to details of the attack obtained exclusively by the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, An Israeli drone fired three times at a WCK convoy in the city of Deir al Balah, in the center of the enclave, even though the vehicles were clearly marked with the organization's logo.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
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A first missile hit the car leading the convoy and the survivors ran to take refuge in the next vehicle, which was also attacked by another missile seconds later, and when a third vehicle approached to help them, it received another hit, the newspaper revealed.
The Israeli Army's preliminary report, published on Tuesday, concludes that the attack on the humanitarian convoy it was not “intended to harm workers” and was due to “misidentification.”
It was a failure due to a mistaken identification: at night, during a war, in very complex conditions
“I want to be very clear: the attack was not carried out with the intention of harming WCK humanitarian workers. It was a failure due to a mistaken identification: at night, during a war, in very complex conditions. It should not have happened,” said Israeli Army Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi, presenting the preliminary conclusions of his investigation.
Halevi insisted that an “independent entity will investigate the incident thoroughly,” more accurate investigations that will be completed in the coming days, and promised that the Army “will learn from its conclusions, implement immediate measures and share those conclusions with WCK and other relevant international organizations.”
The White House indicated this Wednesday that the United States will not carry out its own investigation and trusts that the Israeli Government will carry out an “exhaustive, complete and transparent” investigation into the event.
EFE and AFP
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