Food is running out. Surgeries and births are taking place without anaesthesia. Fuel shortages mean the only cancer hospital has closed. Without the basics needed to survive, the majority of Gazans are stuck while Israeli bombs fall and Hamas missiles are launched around them.

Tens of thousands of Gazan civilians have so far moved into Southern Gaza. But Israel bombs those areas too. Some civilians choose to stay home or in the hospitals where might still get some care. Some are unable to leave. Others surely think: Why leave if the bombs might fall on them no matter where they go?

Those under siege in Gaza cannot enter Israel, which refuses to allow them into the country. Egypt has only permitted a tiny number of mostly foreign nationals into the country through a border point that has also been bombed.

But take a look at the map. The Gaza Strip includes some 40km of coastline. Could it be a lifeline for aid to coming into Gaza and way for civilians to escape the continuous bombing by the Israeli Defence Forces? 

The answer is yes, but only if it is organized and implemented by a coalition of states and humanitarian agencies not directly involved in the war in Gaza.

As luck would have it, the government of Cyprus – the European country closest to Gaza – is currently negotiating with European and Arab states to create a “humanitarian sea corridor”. The idea, in a nutshell, is for ships carrying aid to sail from the Cypriot port of Limassol directly to the shores of Gaza. There, United Nations personnel would receive and distribute the aid to civilians, hospitals, clinics, and so on. 

If you are wondering how this plan not already in place, the answer is simple, if devastating: since 2007, Israel has enforced an air, sea, and land blockade on the Gaza Strip in an attempt to control everything and everyone that comes in and out of Gaza. On 9 October, the blockade was ‘upgraded’ into a “total blockade” and “complete siege” of Gaza. At the time, Israel’s Defence Minister Yoav Gallant notoriously announced: “No electricity, no food, no water, no gas – it’s all closed.”

Human rights groups like Amnesty International have called the blockade a form of collective punishment, a war crime under international humanitarian law. In 2010, a UN investigation found that “the blockade is unlawful and cannot be sustained in law.” 

It is important to understand that the current, catastrophic humanitarian situation in Gaza is due not only the outbreak of hostilities since 7 October 2023, but the illegal blockade itself. Its consequences are well-documented and wide-ranging. 

In 2022, UNICEF released a report detailing how Israel only approved travel for 64% of requests from patients to leave Gaza for specialized medical treatment. Unemployment – especially among Gaza’s youth – has surged since 2007. Almost 80% of the water pumped into Gaza is unsafe to drink, while poverty means families cannot afford the education costs for their children. This is not just collective punishment; it is a sophisticated and unlawful attempt to collectively humiliate Gazans.

Israel’s blockade on Gaza must be lifted. Humanitarian ideals call for it. Law requires it. Basic decency demands it. 

The details still need to be ironed out, but a sea corridor could look something like this: an ensemble of states working together to establish, maintain, and provide security for the corridor. Security will be paramount, as European states like Greece have made clear they will only participate if their boats are protected.

If a secure corridor is established, states could then request that independent aid organizations like Doctors Without Borders, the Palestine Red Crescent Society, and the International Committee for the Red Cross to provide aid and deliver it to professionals on the shores of Gaza. This could a much more effective way of getting aid to those in need. According to Greece’s Prime Minister, among the benefits of a sea corridor is that “you can pack much more humanitarian aid in a ship than you can in a truck.”

Israel should be convinced to come on board and support such an initiative, but it cannot be actively involved in enforcing any such corridor. It must be an international humanitarian effort. Israel cannot be in charge not only because it is an active participant in the war against Hamas, but also because it has a history of attacking humanitarian transfers seeking to provide Gazans with aid.

In 2010, Israeli forces raided ships in what the “Gaza Freedom Flotilla” and killed nine activists. The raid took place in international waters. A UN fact-finding mission concluded that the attack on the Flotilla “demonstrated levels of totally unnecessary and incredible violence. It betrayed an unacceptable level of brutality.” Despite listing numerous violations of international law, the chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court’s declined to investigate the attacks on the flotilla.

There are signs that the ICC’s may reverse course and prosecute those thwarting the delivery of aid into Gaza. Current Prosecutor Karim Khan recently visited the Rafah border crossing and stated that: “There should not be any impediment to humanitarian relief,” and that the denial of aid gives “rise to criminal responsibility when these rights are curtailed. My office is determined to vindicate those rights.”

Mr. Khan’s statement is important, but people without food, shelter, or water cannot afford to wait for him to act, especially as the Prosecutor has apparently changed the standards of when arrest warrants can be issued from when there are reasonable grounds to do so, to – in his words – only doing so when there is a “realistic prospect of conviction”. 

A humanitarian sea corridor organized and enforced by a coalition of states not implicated in atrocities in Israel or Gaza and independent aid organizations is an idea well-worth pursuing. Right now, it may be the best way to get desperately need aid into Gaza, and people in need out of harm’s way. Of course, if any civilians do choose to leave the Gaza Strip, whether into Egypt or anywhere else, they have the right under international law to return to their homes.

Over the weeks since the 7 October attacks that precipitated today’s hostilities, many states, including Israel’s allies, have proclaimed their desire to protect civilians. They should translate that rhetoric into reality. They should work to have the illegal blockade lifted and secure what could be a life-saving sea corridor to get civilians out of, and desperately needed aid into, Gaza. They must do so before it’s too late.