On Sunday the Belgian military dropped 15 tonnes of humanitarian aid from a plane that was flying in the sky above Gaza. A total of 16 large packages of aid that included foodstuffs such as pasta and rice were dropped. Airdrops are not without risk and on Sunday the parachute that was attached to one of the aid packages closed up again, resulting in it hitting the ground at a much higher speed than had been intended.
Last week, Israel gave permission for the resumption of air drops of aid for Gaza. On Saturday Germany and France were among the countries to make air drops and on Sunday Belgium followed suit. News of the Belgian air drops was announced by the Belgian Defence Minister Theo Francken (N-VA) on the social media platform X.
Watch Sunday's airdrop
The Belgian military had been preparing for the air drop since Friday in Jordan. It was from there that the Belgian military A400M transport aircraft took off on Sunday morning. It was loaded with 16 large packages of food, each weighing approximately 1 tonne. A parachute is attached to each package. Less than a minute after leaving the aircraft, the packages land.
A photo released by the Ministry of Defence shows that the packages’ contents included rice, pasta and canned fish. The images released suggest that the packages were dropped in central Gaza, near the city of Deir al Balah.
Belgium carried out air drops last year too
The Belgian army already has experience with airdrops in Gaza. In March last year, Belgium distributed 164 tonnes of aid through air drops. The Ministry of Defence is expected to continue to carry out airdrops during the coming days.
It is hoped that the airdrops will serve to improve the humanitarian situation in Gaza, where people are dying of malnutrition. Israel barely allows aid to enter Gaza by other means. However, aid organisations, say that airdrops are inefficient and expensive compared to aid delivered by land.