After Israel's nearly three months of total blockade of aid to Gaza, the Palestinian civilian population is in desperate need of food, water, and medicine, while reports of killed children continue to pour in.
However, Israel's ambassador to Sweden, Ziv Nevo Kulman, believes that Israel has acted since the meeting at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The country has opened up for aid through the strongly criticized Israeli-American organization Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), whose distribution centers have become known as death traps. Hundreds of Palestinians are reported to have been shot dead while waiting for food packages.
The organization's first manager, Jake Wood, resigned in May because the mission was not compatible with "humanitarian principles".
GHF has only four distribution centers – one in central and three in southern Gaza – unlike the previous UN system that distributed aid from 400 distribution centers before the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas collapsed in March.
But the systems cannot be compared, Kulman believes, who claims that several of the UN's facilities have been destroyed. He puts the blame on Hamas, which he believes bears sole responsibility for all suffering in Gaza - from Israel's warfare, which has resulted in destroyed UN facilities and tens of thousands of dead civilians, to the famine after Israel's blockade.
"Can end tomorrow"
The war can end tomorrow if Hamas releases the hostages being held under terrible conditions. No one talks about the 50 (about half are believed to already be dead) who are still left, chained underground and starving, says Kulman in the interview, which the embassy itself took the initiative to.
Israeli families of hostages after Hamas' terror attack on October 7, 2023, when over 1,200 people - most of them civilians - were killed, have increasingly begun to criticize the war. They are worried that their relatives may be in the condition that Kulman describes, and that it will soon be too late to get them home alive.
But the only way to get the hostages home at the moment is, according to Kulman, to continue the war, even though only eight people have been rescued by Israel's military, while 140 have been released alive through negotiations, according to the news agency AP's compilation. So why not use the method that has proven to be the most successful?
It is Hamas that has said no to all proposals for a ceasefire that the US has put forward, says Kulman.
He also dismisses the criticism that has been directed from the EU's Foreign Minister Kaja Kallas. The Commission previously stated that Israel has breached the trade agreement with the EU, which is based on respect for human rights, through its actions in Gaza.
As I have already said, we have already acted, he says, referring to GHF.
Blames Hamas
So how many dead children, in addition to the over 50,000 who have already been reported killed or injured, is Israel willing to accept to achieve its goals?
We do not want this war, and this war could end tomorrow. I know that tragic things happen in war, but it is not our intention. It is Hamas that uses its population as human shields, says Kulman without answering the question of whether Israel has any limit.
TT: You blame Hamas for the fact that children have been killed in Israel's warfare. Let's say that it would be the case that Hamas has used civilians as human shields in every case, which you have claimed since the start of the war, why are you still not doing enough to protect civilians. Do they not mean anything to you?
We do a lot to protect civilians by informing them in advance before we attack. It is, of course, a war, and it is not nice when people need to move from one place to another, and when residential areas are destroyed.
Does not want to answer about Gaza's future
According to the UN, almost the entire population of Gaza has been displaced from their homes. In May, Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israel will take control of the entire Gaza Strip.
Kulman does not want to answer "yes" or "no" to the question of whether this is Israel's new goal, more than that it is not included in the goals set by the country's official war cabinet.
We have no intention of staying in Gaza or displacing the population.
So what Netanyahu (who is part of the war cabinet) says is not true?
The goal is to deradicalize Gaza from Hamas control, says Kulman.
