Cargo ship at dock in Limassol Cyprus © sirtravelalot/Shutterstock
While the international community is facing the challenge of getting humanitarian aid to Gaza amid restrictions in place, Cyprus has proposed the creation of a maritime corridor to reach civilians in need. Despite the technical challenges lying in its implementation, EU leaders seem to be supportive of this plan
On November 6, the European Commission announced that it is quadrupling EU aid to Gaza, by adding another €25 million, to be provided to humanitarian organisations providing life-saving assistance. In other words, by doing so, the European Union will have spent this year a total of €100 million in humanitarian aid for Gazans. The biggest challenge, however, is how to ensure that aid will actually reach civilians in need.
So far, essential supplies, such as food, water and medicine, have been reaching the Gaza strip through the Rafah crossing with Egypt, the only one which is currently open, but of quite limited capacities due to strict conditions imposed by Israel. As stated by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), the ‘modest’ number of trucks that has managed to enter via the Rafah border crossing during the last weeks is ‘wholly inadequate compared to the vast sea of needs’.
According to the most recent update issued by the organisation on November 7, despite diplomatic efforts to ensure the delivery of much needed supplies, only a small fraction of humanitarian aid available has been actually reaching Gazans, in what is being described as an ‘increasingly dire’ situation.
Cyprus’ Amalthea Initiative
During the Paris International Conference on Humanitarian Aid held on November 9, 2023, the President of Cyprus, Nikos Christodoulides, presented his country’s proposal for an alternative solution to the problem. Named after the foster mother of Zeus, symbolically alluding to an ancient Greek symbol of generosity and altruism (the horn through which the Greek God was nurtured and thus, kept to life), the ‘Amalthea Initiative’ is a 25-page plan designed to help supply Gaza with much needed additional humanitarian aid.
The initiative foresees the creation of a maritime corridor facilitating the provision of humanitarian aid from Cyprus to the Gaza strip. In Paris, Christodoulides introduced the five different stages of the plan, according to which aid will be collected, inspected and stored in Larnaca, the city which has a port and an airport, but also hosts an innovative Joint Rescue Coordination Centre.
Supplies will be sent to Gaza on a daily basis through a safe maritime corridor, the inspection of which will be conducted by a joint committee, including Israel. The final stage of the plan consists of the unloading and distribution of the aid to the civilian population. It is worth noting that one ship equals 500 trucks of humanitarian aid; in this sense, if executed, the plan can have a great impact in terms of magnitude.
A few days after the conference, Christodoulidis posted a message on social media expressing his optimism for the fact that the Initiative ‘has been gaining traction and political endorsement as a sustained, reliable, secure and viable route for humanitarian aid to Gaza’. He also committed to working closely with everyone interested in ‘servicing the ultimate humanitarian goal’.
Several EU leaders have publicly supported the plan; France even proposed to expand the corridor to support the creation of floating hospital ships that could help manage the dramatic healthcare crisis that is currently being experienced in Gaza.
However, questions remain on the practical feasibility of this ambitious plan. Janez Lenarčič, the European Commissioner for Crisis Management, told reporters on Monday that "(A) maritime corridor is one of the possibilities we would support", but also pointed to the logistical difficulties behind such an endeavour, starting with the fact that, at the moment, there is no harbour fit for such a purpose on the Gaza coast.
Moving on with the plan would probably mean identifying a suitable landing zone in southern Gaza and creating the necessary infrastructure to receive the aid; a project which could be time-consuming and precarious. Moreover, other challenges would involve coping with security-related issues and ensuring that the aid reaches the people that it is meant for and not Hamas.
To all these concerns Cyprus has answered by projecting its ‘credibility as a member state of the EU and the excellent diplomatic relations with the states of the region’, factors which the country perceives as ‘essential components for strengthening and shielding the initiative’.
The diplomatic symbolism of the initiative
At a geographical proximity of only 210 nautical miles away from Gaza, Cyprus is the only EU member which is so close to the conflict zone. In this sense, there are highly moral implications in Cyprus’ initiative to make good use of its key geopolitical position to ensure that aid will reach its beneficiaries.
This is an excellent opportunity for this small but very important island on the Mediterranean to project the long-standing good relations that it maintains with the states of the region, the cooperation of which is critical for the success of this ambitious endeavour. By taking a leading role in providing a solution to a dead-end situation that the EU is currently facing, and asking other stakeholders to join forces towards this humanitarian cause, Cyprus not only becomes a frontrunner in geostrategic developments by ‘thinking out of the box’, but also brings forward the positive paradigm of EU values and international synergy, which is even more necessary -both as an action and as a narrative- in times of division and conflict.
“Historically and due to the island’s strategic location in the Eastern Mediterranean, the Republic of Cyprus has always offered its ports and airports in order to facilitate humanitarian aid to neighbouring countries in the Middle East, especially Lebanon during hard times when the civil war was underway”, says Gabriel Haritos, Adjunct Lecturer at the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (Israel) and Visiting Professor at Panteion University (Greece), where he teaches History of the Political Relations between Israel, Greece and Cyprus.
Talking to OBCT from Jerusalem, where he is based, Professor Haritos explains that Cyprus has always been a ‘safe hub’ for Israeli citizens as well, starting with the first Gulf War in the early 1990s’.
Nevertheless, this time, Nicosia’s eagerness to lead an ambitious humanitarian initiative by joining world leaders under a shared goal should be seen in juxtaposition to Turkey’s diplomacy in the region, considering the long-term impact of critical moments in recent history, such as the Mavi Marmara Incident.
“It is not the first time that Cyprus plays a crucial role concerning the humanitarian needs of the Palestinian population in Gaza”, maintains Haritos. “The matter is not simple, since Turkey is willing to connect the issue of the Israeli closure of the Gaza Strip due to security reasons, with the fact that the illegal administrative entity which Turkey has established in the occupied territories of the northern part of Cyprus - the so-called ‘Turkish republic of Northern Cyprus’ - is not recognised by the international community”.
Prof. Haritos recalls that back in 2010, when the Gaza Strip was facing another humanitarian crisis following a round of violence between Hamas, the Islamic Jihad and Israel, Turkey was willing to offer humanitarian aid by stopping the Israeli blockade of the port of Gaza.
He stresses, however, that Turkey had planned the itinerary of the Mavi Marmara flotilla in a way that would serve the following narrative: “As the Israelis are isolating the Palestinians in Gaza, the Greek-Cypriots are doing the same, causing the diplomatic and political isolation of the Turkish-Cypriots and the illegal administrative entity which Turkey established on November 15, 1983”.
Haritos describes how the then President of the Republic of Cyprus, Dimitris Christofias, whose AKEL communist party’s stance toward the Arab-Israeli conflict was and continues to be openly pro-Palestinian, decided not to allow the Mavi Marmara flotilla to enter Cypriot territorial waters at the moment when the Turkish ship was about to enter the port of Famagusta (a port which is under the de facto control of ‘TRNC’, yet considered a ‘closed port’ for the Republic of Cyprus, therefore illegal).
That decision resulted in a series of meetings between the Republic of Cyprus and Israel, also with Greece, while the bilateral relations between Turkey’s Erdogan administration and Israel were gradually deteriorating.
Seeing the wider picture, the Cypriot plan could, in fact, be perceived as an EU-made response to Turkey’s diplomacy in the region, by providing a counternarrative of solidarity towards innocent civilians and interregional mediation.
The outcome of Nicosia’s ongoing dialogue with Israel will be critical, while in the upcoming weeks Cyprus will intensify its discussions not only with other regional partners, but also with humanitarian organisations on the ground, the role of which will be pivotal for the smooth and safe execution of the plan.
