The United Nations has warned that Israel's military incursion into Rafah and closure of border crossings is a major setback for aid operations in the Gaza Strip, with dire consequences for the population.
The United Nations said on Wednesday that Israel had sent tanks and troops into Rafah and blocked two southern crossings near Rafah on the Egyptian border and Kerem Shalom on the Israeli border, which contain much of the aid, since Sunday in Gaza. It was announced that there were no aid trucks in the area. .
Israel announced that the Kerem Shalom intersection had reopened on Wednesday, but did not indicate when the Rafah intersection would reopen. The United Nations disputed Israel's claims.
Fighting in the Rafah area and border closures have forced aid efforts, at least temporarily, into the first phase of a war in which an Israeli-Egyptian blockade has prevented anything from entering Gaza and led to desperate food shortages. I'm back to where I was for a few weeks. water, fuel, medicine, and other supplies. Israel said the military action it launched on Monday was a limited incursion into Rafah, where it had taken control of the border crossing, rather than the full-scale attack it had vowed to carry out, despite warnings from the United States and aid groups. Explaining. A humanitarian disaster.
UN officials said the situation threatened to halt all humanitarian operations in Gaza.
As many as one million people, more than half of them children, have fled from other parts of Gaza, living in squalid conditions and relying on international aid efforts for their refuge.
“Rafah is the epicenter of humanitarian operations in Gaza,” UN Secretary-General António Guterres said on Tuesday. “Attacking Rafah would bring famine closer to home and further undermine our efforts to support people in humanitarian distress.”
Before the war began last October, about 500 aid trucks and additional commercial trucks were transporting supplies a day to Gaza, home to about 2.3 million people. Even after deliveries resume, volumes remain at a fraction of pre-war levels, as Israel has closed most checkpoints, insisted on strict inspection of all packages, and banned the supply of some supplies. It was one.
Under intense international pressure on Israel, including from the United States, the number of humanitarian aid trucks has increased to an average of more than 200 per day from late April to early May, according to the United Nations, but still significantly exceeds aid agencies' announcements. has fallen below. It's necessary and what the Biden administration was looking for. No commercial trucks have entered Gaza since the war began in October.
The United Nations and aid groups have also struggled for months to secure access and safe movement for staff working in Gaza, despite intense negotiations with Israel.
Now, UN officials say the limited progress achieved so far is in jeopardy.
“We are managing the entire aid operation opportunistically, not holistically. We will grab what we can,” U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said in an interview Wednesday.
“We want the ability to be in the middle of a conflict zone and the people we're trying to help to be able to work without fear,” he added.
A day earlier, Andrea de Domenico, head of the United Nations humanitarian office in the Palestinian territories, said in a video conference with reporters from Jerusalem that fuel would run out in days, communications would be cut off, hospitals would be closed and food and other essential supplies would be depleted. He said that distribution would be halted. assistance.
Gaza's power grid stopped functioning early in the war. The only electricity currently available is a generator, and fuel is essential.
De Domenico said the presence of Israeli tanks and fighting around the Rafah border had made it impossible for the United Nations to access fuel in storage facilities in the area. He added that people were evacuated from Rafah to areas without shelter, clean water or drainage facilities.
“It is impossible to improve the situation in new evacuation centers without the access of supplies and the fuel to transport them to areas where people are concentrated,” De Domenico said.
U.N. officials said if the area around the Rafah crossing became a war zone, aid deliveries and distribution would be nearly impossible.