Palestinians can’t catch a break – even facing debilitating starvation, imposed by over 5 months of a complete land, sea and air blockade, at least 3 were instantly and brutally killed by falling crates torpedoing from a faulty parachute during a US/Israeli airdrop.

In late January, the hashtag #AirDropAidforGaza was trending amid efforts to airdrop aid to the North of Gaza, with proponents claiming that the airdrops were a necessary act considering the complete absence of food aid and medicine, which were already trickling in at highly insufficient rates into Rafah.

The campaign to airdrop aid was spearheaded on X (formerly Twitter) by Western-based pro-Palestine activists, who used the online campaign to push for neighboring countries to send aid by air as the Rafah border crossing remained shut.

Amidst growing domestic discontentment and anger, Jordan utilized the airdrops as convenient PR. Amman did not hesitate to utilize the event as an opportunity to whitewash its image from the nation that has opened up its airspace to help “Israel” repel Resistance attacks, mass imports food to the Zionist entity, and assists it in catching the flow of Iran and Syrian sourced weapons to the Resistance.

Likewise, Egypt and the US utilized the airdrop campaign as a convenient PR tactic, as this kept Gazans' only lifeline sealed shut at the Rafah crossing. Over 2,000 trucks continue to be lined up in Rafah as Cairo’s regime plays into US theatrics on neighboring countries that Washington has relied on to reinforce the genocidal blockade on Gaza.

One of the initial aid drops fell into the Mediterranean Sea, with desperate Palestinians scrambling and retrieving the package from the water in the late-winter cold. Advocates of the airdrop campaign, claimed it was an intentional move to keep “Israel”, which already had knowledge of the airdrops, from somehow destroying the aid.

But it became more apparent that the only intentional motive was to continue to keep badly-needed food and supplies from Gaza, when airdrops then landed in occupied Palestine/"Israel’s" side of the Gazan border on February 29.

It becomes more insidious when put into context of the reality – "Israel" controls the airspace so the airdrops were under their watch, monitored and approved by the occupation.

The airdrops received approval from "Tel Aviv", which should say enough – directly supported by the genocide-waging colony that made it clear no food or water would be allowed into Gaza at the onset of the siege in October.

Again, just as Western sanctions on “enemy” countries, which undeniably hurt innocent civilians, claim to target leaders, Levy again echoes the same tired excuse to justify mass-punishment campaigns on resistant nations: that preventing aid from passing through “Hamas” or ideas of a Hamas-controlled UNRWA is so necessary that throwing single boxes off planes is a required substitute for thousands of trucks distributing aid in an organized fashion.

Then the US joined, in the context of popular pressure and wide waves of uncommitted votes in its primaries. As Biden promotes a 6-week ceasefire, perfectly timed to placate discontented Muslim American voters, the US also sent rotten food down on Gaza. The US’ paltry gesture aligns with "Israel’s" continued weaponization of starvation in Gaza, allowing "Tel Aviv" to maintain its total starvation of Gaza while alleviating public pressure at the border.

Airdropping aid to northern Gaza is certainly better than nothing, but the way it’s currently being done is dehumanizing, chaotic, humiliating , dangerous and somewhat ineffective. Airdrops occur randomly in various locations in northern Gaza, leading to situations where all…

— حسام شبات (@HossamShabat) March 2, 2024

In the above post, North Gaza-based citizen journalist Hossam Shabat brings to light another aspect of the aid drops, both conceptually and in action – they are simply insulting. He observes his starving countrymen having to “scavenge” in a chaotic scramble for haphazardly dropped supplies, as opposed to opening the border to aid in an organized manner. 

The Palestinian people and Resistance, having struggled and sacrificed for over eight decades under occupation, are sustained by their dignity – something both overt Zionists, as well as liberal self-proclaimed allies in the West, time and time again transgress against or actively seek to subdue. By opting for a distribution method aimed at dehumanizing Palestinians “like animals in the wild,” “Israel” and the US elect yet another method of adding insult to injury.

Even the UN, which couldn’t even bring itself to call the starvation in Gaza a famine, slammed the airdrops as “dangerous” and “inefficient.”

An Oxfam statement slammed the move, stating "Oxfam does not support US airdrops to Gaza, which would mostly serve to relieve the guilty consciences of senior US officials whose policies are contributing to the ongoing atrocities and risk of famine.”

One joint Jordanian and US airdrop announced dropping 38,000 meals to Gaza on March 1, which, even when taken at face value, is insufficient in assisting even 5 percent of North Gaza’s starving population of 700,000 alone for one meal.

In reinforcing the blockade, the airdrop theatrics work in tandem with US support of Israeli goals in continuing the blockade and planning for a takeover of the Rafah border crossing to cut off supply of all imports going into Gaza. It’s evident that from the missed aim of some of the drops and deadly results of others, that incompetence has also been weaponized in order to allow the brutal policy of mass starvation and deprivation-induced genocide to continue, while capturing a couple of pictures of paragliding parcels for the photo-ops.

 At Biden’s March 7 State of the Union address at the US Capitol building, he unveiled Washington’s plans to establish a temporary port to receive aid.

Given that the US has strict autonomy and responsibility over enabling “Israel’s” continued siege on Gaza, it is evident that Biden’s empty words come across as a tone-deaf appeasement tactic, supplementing the White House’s proposal of a paltry 6-week pause to the genocide, made following the US' vehement rejection of global calls for a ceasefire and desire to placate growing discontentment of Muslim Americans increasingly rejecting him at the polls.

But beyond lip service, Biden’s “port” proposal underlies more nefarious intentions – the reality that Biden's "temporary port" in Gaza for "aid" was never meant to be a solution. It operates as a pilot for yet another US/Israeli base to allow Israelis to re-militarize Gaza under their control, under Biden's framework of establishing a comprador government in the enclave.

This of course occurs in tandem with “Israel” securing control over oil and gas in the offshore region that belongs to Palestinians. If Biden wants a solution, he can easily stop this genocide and open up the Rafah border to food and medical aid. 

The planned ground invasion of Rafah, coupled with “Israel” and the US’ final push to demilitarize and sever Gaza of its people and its Resistance, needed a necessary distraction tactic – one full of hot air.