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SvennoJ on 04 December 2024
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Humanitarian aid to Gaza ‘outrageously’ blocked: UN’s Guterres

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the humanitarian “nightmare” in Gaza is “not a crisis of logistics”.

“Aid is outrageously being blocked,” he said in a post on social media. “It’s a crisis of political will and of respect for fundamental principles of international humanitarian law,” he said.

The UN chief’s brief comments follow the recent killing of more aid workers in Gaza by Israeli forces and a brutal siege on northern Gaza by Israel’s military that has now lasted 60 days and prevented local residents from accessing water, food and medicine.

Israel has been accused of imposing starvation on Gaza and using hunger as a weapon against the local Palestinian population.

 
‘Our warehouses are empty’ of humanitarian aid, says NGO official

Amjad Shawa, director of the Palestinian NGOs Network, says the humanitarian situation in Gaza is worsening as winter approaches with only a trickle of aid coming in.

“The winter makes things very complicated for tens of thousands of families, many of whom are living in approximately 100,000 tents all over the Gaza Strip,” he told Al Jazeera from Deir el-Balah, in central Gaza.

“I cannot even describe these tents as real tents. They are pieces of plastic and cloth which cover small spaces, under which live the elderly, children and the sick,” he said. “At times, we have 10 to 15 people staying inside.”

Shawa said thousands of tents have already been flooded and damaged, and many families spent the night in the cold, with nothing to protect their hunger-weakened bodies.

“We still warn of more catastrophes in the Gaza Strip, the repercussions will be unprecedented, especially for the children. We cannot provide them with anything. As NGOs and aid centres, our warehouses are empty of aid.”