A senior United Nations official said on Friday that food supplies to the southern Gaza Strip are at risk after Israel expanded the scope of its military operations, adding that those displaced by the Israeli offensive there are facing a public health crisis.
Carl Skau, Deputy Executive Director of the United Nations World Food Programme, said that the situation is currently deteriorating in southern Gaza, with the severity of hunger and the risk of famine in the northern Gaza Strip worsening over the past months.
The Rafah crossing on the border with Egypt was the main supply line for aid earlier in the eight-month-long war, but work there stopped when in early May Israel expanded the scope of its military campaign in the city of Rafah, where most of the Strip’s population lived.
After a two-day visit to Gaza, Skaw added, “We had built up stocks before the operation in Rafah so that we could feed people, but the stocks started to run out, and we no longer have the same access (to individuals) that we need, and that we were used to.”
When Israel advanced on Rafah, a large number of refugees there were displaced again towards the north and towards the Al-Mawasi area on the coast, which is classified as a humanitarian area.
“This is a displacement crisis that is truly a protection disaster, with the million or so people expelled from Rafah now crammed into a small space along the beach,” Skaw continued.
He pointed out, “The weather is hot, and the condition of sanitation facilities is very poor. We were driving through rivers of sewage. It is a public health crisis in the making.”
Aid distribution operations are facing difficulties as a result of military operations, Israel’s delay in issuing the necessary permits, and the increase in chaos inside the Gaza Strip.
Skau noted that despite the increase in food shipments entering northern Gaza, there is a need to provide residents with basic health care, water and sanitation “to completely shift the famine curve in the north,” stressing that Israel must allow more health care needs into Gaza. .
Israel says it does not impose any restrictions on the entry of relief supplies to civilians in Gaza, and accuses the United Nations of slowing down aid deliveries or not implementing them efficiently.
The war began when gunmen from the Hamas movement attacked Israeli towns on October 7, which, according to Israeli statistics, led to the death of 1,200 people and the taking of about 250 hostages to Gaza.
According to officials with the health authorities in Gaza, the military operation carried out by Israel in response to this attack has so far led to the death of more than 37 thousand Palestinians, in addition to the destruction of a large part of the Strip.
Skau concluded by saying that he was “surprised by the level of destruction and the people of Gaza groaning as a result of this conflict. When I was there in December, they were angry and frustrated. There was tension. Now, I feel more that people are tired and upset. They don’t want anything but to end this matter.” .
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