Residents of Gaza City are grappling with an increasingly desperate humanitarian situation, with no access to safe drinking water, food, or basic necessities, according to a UK-based aid official.
Mai Elawawda, a communications officer for the UK-based charity Medical Aid for Palestinians, described dire conditions in a message from southern Gaza, saying, “The future is utterly bleak,” reports UNB citing BBC.
She added: “After more than 19 months of forced starvation, dehydration, and displacement, we do not know how much longer we can hold on.”
According to Elawawda, there is “extremely limited” access to safe drinking water, and food is no longer available in markets. What little remains is priced far beyond what most people can afford.
Infant formula has become almost impossible to find, and in the rare cases it is available, it costs over $25. Nappies, she noted, are being sold for more than $30, “well beyond the reach of displaced families who cannot even secure their daily meals.”
During a visit to Gaza City last week, she said: “you would not find a single loaf of bread for sale.”
New Canadian Foreign Minister Anita Anand accused Israel on Wednesday of using a lack of food as a political tool in its Gaza operation and urged further work on a ceasefire with Hamas, the resistance group that controls the Palestinian enclave.
"We cannot allow the continued use of food as a political tool ... Over 50,000 people have died as a result of the aggression caused against the Palestinians and the Gazan people in Palestine. Using food as a political tool is simply unacceptable," Anand told reporters ahead of a cabinet meeting, reports Reuters.
"We need to continue to work towards a ceasefire. We need to ensure that we have a two-state solution, and Canada will continue to maintain that position."
Israel blocked all aid from entering Gaza on March 2, before resuming operations on March 18 after talks to prolong a six-week ceasefire collapsed.
The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a US-supported NGO, said it would begin distributing humanitarian aid in Gaza this month after talks with Israeli officials.
It said it had asked Israel to secure distribution points in northern Gaza, and that Israel had agreed.
Human Rights Watch said on Thursday that Israel's total blockade of the Gaza Strip, has become "a tool of extermination."
"Israel's blockade has transcended military tactics to become a tool of extermination," HRW interim executive director Federico Borello said in a statement.
In its statement, HRW said that "the Israeli government's plan to demolish what remains of Gaza's civilian infrastructure and concentrate the Palestinian population into a tiny area would amount to an abhorrent escalation of its ongoing crimes against humanity, ethnic cleansing, and acts of genocide."
For weeks, humanitarian organizations and the United Nations have warned that supplies of everything from food and clean water to fuel and medicine are reaching new lows.
Borello also criticized "plans to squeeze Gaza's 2 million people into an even tinier area while making the rest of the land uninhabitable."
