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UNRWA media adviser Adnan Abu Hasna said 1.6 million Palestinians in Gaza are facing dangerous or varying levels of malnutrition and food insecurity as a severe storm system hits the enclave, while UNRWA says thousands of trucks carrying tents, blankets and food remain blocked at Gaza’s crossings.
This grave warning comes as a severe storm system hits the enclave, tearing down thousands of worn-out tents, while Israel is holding 6,000 trucks carrying hundreds of thousands of tents, blankets and food supplies at Gaza’s crossings.
Abu Hasna told Al Jazeera the current storm system is having immediate, catastrophic effects on the lives of displaced people.
He said the storm has torn down thousands of tents and that rainwater and sewage have flooded large residential areas, stressing that most of the so-called tents were erected haphazardly from plastic sheets and scraps of fabric and, in practice, do not qualify as real tents capable of protecting those sheltering inside.
Abu Hasna noted that even proper tents have become worn out and effectively useless after repeated displacement, dozens of times, and are unable to withstand the storms or heavy rains currently hitting the Gaza Strip.
The U.N. official said people in Gaza feel the war is continuing, but in different forms and through other means.
He said the continued deterioration of humanitarian conditions, the growing number of patients, and the failure to allow in hundreds of types of food and nonfood items, along with spare parts for sewage and water facilities, medical equipment and medicines, are all different forms of an ongoing war against the civilian population.
Regarding the aid being held up, Abu Hasna said Israel is preventing UNRWA from bringing in 6,000 trucks carrying hundreds of thousands of tents the agency purchased for hundreds of millions of dollars, supplies that people now urgently lack.
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