New Delhi: After the United Nations warned that all humanitarian work would stop in Gaza by Wednesday night due to lack of fuel, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Wednesday evening that some relief was reaching the besieged enclave but it was “a drop of aid in an ocean of need”.
The UN chief posted on X that the people of Gaza needed “continuous aid delivery at a level that corresponds to the enormous needs. It must be delivered without restrictions.”
Three convoys of 62 trucks, carrying food and other relief material, have been allowed to trickle into Gaza by Israel, which continues to bomb the strip in retaliation to Hamas’s surprise attack on southern Israel towns on 7 October that killed over 1400 people.
Israel has also cut off food, water, electricity and fuel to the region, and is poised for a ground incursion to rescue the 222 people being held captive and to “fully dismantle” Hamas, which controls the strip.
The relief trucks sent since 21 October, however, contain no fuel as Israel has rejected appeals for fuel to enter Gaza for humanitarian needs. This is because Israel classified diesel as a “dual use” good that can be used for military as well as civilian purposes. Therefore, it is heavily controlled or restricted and only allowed for Gaza’s sole power plant, Al Jazeera reported.
The lack of fuel means Gaza will soon be in complete darkness, which would majorly hamper its hospitals, flooded with the wounded from the over two-week aerial strikes.
The UN’s agency for the relief of Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, has said it would be forced to halt its operations in Gaza from Wednesday night due to the lack of fuel. It has also said the relief material sent so far was woefully short of what was needed.
Guterres is in the crosshairs of the Israelis after he said Tuesday that he unequivocally condemned the deadly attacks by Hamas in Israel on 7 October but that it was important to recognise they “did not happen in a vacuum”.
Addressing a meeting of the UN Security Council in New York, Guterres also said the Palestinian people had been subjected to 56 years of “suffocating occupation”.
He described how Palestinians had “seen their land steadily devoured by settlements and plagued by violence; their economy stifled; their people displaced and their homes demolished”.
Decrying the “collective punishment of the Palestinian people”, Guterres also said he was deeply concerned about “the clear violations of international humanitarian law that we are witnessing in Gaza”.
Israel reacted angrily with its ambassador to the UN Gilad Erdan accusing Guterres of “justifying terrorism” and demanded his immediate resignation.
Erdan later said on Israeli radio: “Due to his remarks we will refuse to issue visas to UN representatives. We have already refused a visa for under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs Martin Griffiths. The time has come to teach them a lesson.”
Meanwhile, the death toll so far in the enclave is 6,546, including 2,704 children, according to the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry. The figure includes 756 people – 344 of whom were children – killed in the last 24 hours. Hamas said 17,439 had been wounded in total.
Meanwhile, Oxfam has said that starvation was being used as a “weapon of war” against civilians in Gaza. “Just 2 per cent of the usual food has been delivered to Gaza since the siege was imposed,” it said in a statement.
The international aid group said: “Every day the situation worsens. Children are experiencing severe trauma from the constant bombardment, their drinking water is polluted or rationed and soon families may not be able to feed them too. How much more are Gazans expected to endure?’
Oxfam also called for an immediate ceasefire, unfettered, equitable access to the entire Gaza Strip for humanitarian aid, and all necessary food, water, medical and fuel supplies for the Gaza people.
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