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MADRID 22 Nov. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The special deputy coordinator and resident coordinator of the United Nations Office of the Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process (UNSCO), Muhannad Hadi, denounced this Thursday that the distribution of humanitarian aid in the Strip Gaza “is paralyzed” both by the impediments of the Israeli authorities and by the increase in looting.
“The delivery of critical aid in Gaza – including food, water, fuel and medical supplies – is coming to a standstill. The survival of two million people hangs by a thread,” he warned in a statement in which he stressed that the Humanitarian agencies “remain committed to providing aid” but their ability to do so “is increasingly in question.”
Hadi has emphasized that for more than six weeks the Israeli authorities have banned commercial imports, while “armed” looting against humanitarian convoys and truck drivers has increased, all of this “fueled by the collapse of law and order.” public and security”.
This year, UN trucks have been looted 75 times – 15 of them this month – and armed people have broken into UN facilities 34 times. “Just last week, a driver was shot in the head and hospitalized along with another truck driver,” he said. Furthermore, this Saturday almost a hundred trucks were looted in a single attack.
This situation, which has “further undermined” the ability of UN agencies and other NGOs to collect supplies in border areas and deliver critical aid, is causing bakeries to close “one after another” due to lack of flour or fuel to run electrical generators.
In this sense, he stressed that Palestinian civilians “fight to survive in uninhabitable conditions, in the midst of incessant hostilities.” “Brought to the brink, they lack access to the essential aid they desperately need to endure this unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe,” he said.
Finally, Hadi has demanded that the conditions be established for safe and unhindered humanitarian access through Gaza and has maintained that his calls on behalf of the civilian population “can no longer be ignored.” “The atrocities must end,” he concluded.
In October 2023, the Israeli Army began a bloody offensive against the Gaza Strip following the Hamas attacks, which left 1,200 dead and about 250 hostages. Since then, Gazan authorities have recorded the deaths of more than 44,000 Palestinians, in addition to more than 785 Palestinians killed at the hands of Israeli security forces and in attacks by settlers in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.