Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant hosted US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Wednesday in southern Israel. The Minister and Secretary visited Kibbutz Nir Oz, one of the communities that suffered a severe attack by the Hamas terrorist organization on October 7th. The Minister and Secretary also visited “Kerem Shalom”, one of the key land crossings used to facilitate the delivery of humanitarian aid to the civilian population in Gaza.
Upon arrival at the crossing, the Secretary, the Minister, and their respective delegations received a professional briefing by senior security officials, focused on the efforts made to provide humanitarian aid, as well as the measures taken by the IDF’s Southern Command to streamline coordination and deconfliction with international partners and organizations. Later in the day, Minister Gallant and Secretary Blinken toured the various stations of the crossing and overlooked the security and inspection process for incoming goods.
The Secretary and Minister held an intimate discussion, joined by senior officials including the IDF Chief of the General Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi, Director General of the Israel Ministry of Defense Maj. Gen. (Res.) Eyal Zamir, and Director of the Policy Bureau Dror Shalom. The parties discussed efforts to return the hostages held in Gaza, and the importance of continuing military operations in order to dismantle the Hamas terrorist organization.
“I just finished a productive visit with Secretary of State Antony Blinken, here in Kerem Shalom. We discussed how are we going to expand the flow of humanitarian support into Gaza. We decided to open today the ‘Erez’ crossing on the northern side of Gaza and to allow ships to offload humanitarian supplies in Ashdod and to be able to move directly to the northern side of Gaza, in order to bring water, humanitarian supplies, medicine and food. We are taking significant measures in order to increase the volume of humanitarian aid in Gaza. This is essential,” Gallant stated after the meeting.
“We are fighting Hamas, a brutal terrorist organization. We are not fighting the civilians in Gaza, and we will facilitate the delivery of humanitarian aid. At the same time, as I said and mentioned to the Secretary of State, I would like to emphasize that this war was started by Hamas, a brutal terrorist organization that is located [mere] meters from the border of Israel, as a proxy of Iran. They attacked us on October 7th and killed more than a thousand innocent people, including kids, women, and men. [They] kidnapped more than 250 – 133 are still in Gaza. We are determined to destroy the Hamas organization and to bring the hostages back to their families,” he added.
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