17 September 2016•Update: 18 September 2016
By Noor Abu Aisha
GAZA CITY, Palestine
The Palestinian Ministry of Social Affairs on Saturday began to distribute Turkish aid in the Gaza Strip.
"We have come to the Gaza Strip to deliver aid to the Gazans,” Fahrettin Göker of Turkey’s Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD) said.
“We tell you that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan oversees the aid until it is given to the Gazans,” Göker added.
For his part, Youssef Ibrahim, the undersecretary of the Ministry of Social Affairs in Gaza, said the Turkish aid will be distributed on phases.
“Around 200 families will benefit from the Turkish aid in the first phase,” he said.
Ibrahim explained that each aid package to be distributed in the first phase will include flour, sugar and cooking oil.
On September 7, a Turkish ship carrying 2,500 tons of humanitarian aid bound for the Gaza Strip docked in the Israeli port city of Ashdod. The vessel was the second of its kind to arrive for the Gaza Strip.
In July, the Turkish government sent a ship carrying humanitarian aid that was eventually distributed to the people of the Gaza Strip.
The Turkish aid to Gaza comes within the context of a deal signed this summer between Turkey and Israel in which the two agreed to restore diplomatic relations following a six-year hiatus.
According to Turkish officials, Tel Aviv has met all of Ankara’s preconditions for normalizing ties, which were severed in 2010 after Israeli commandos stormed a Gaza-bound Turkish aid vessel in international waters.
The attack resulted in the death of nine Turkish activists and left another 30 injured, one of whom succumbed to his injuries nearly four years later.
