The economic and humanitarian situation in Gaza is worse now than at any time since Israel occupied the area in 1967, claims a report by eight leading charities that calls for direct negotiations with Hamas and an end to Israel’s “blockade policy.”
The report was published on the day a seminary in Jerusalem was attacked, killing eight people. Early reports suggested the killer acted alone, but later several Palestinian and Lebanese organisations claimed responsibility, including Hamas.
The report also followed two incursions by Israeli armed forces into Gaza that killed about 120 people. One Israeli air attack last week destroyed a clinic and medical equipment maintained in Gaza city by Oxfam, one of the charities that compiled the report.
The charities’ report about conditions in Gaza said that hospitals are without electricity, and the number of patients allowed to leave Gaza for treatment has steadily declined. The other charities that compiled the report were Amnesty International, Save the Children UK, Care International UK, Christian Aid, the Catholic Agency for Overseas Development, Médecins du Monde UK, and the Irish development charity Trócaire.
“The Gaza economy is no longer on the brink of collapse—it has collapsed,” argues the report. Heavy restrictions on imports, combined with a bar on exports, have sharply accelerated the shrinkage of Gaza’s economy. Of 3900 factories operating in the Gaza Strip six months ago, 3500 are now closed. More than 80% of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip now depend on international humanitarian help, up from 63% in 2006.
The World Food Programme reported that the mean household monthly income has fallen by 22% in less than four months, between June and September 2007, and the number of Palestinian households in Gaza living on less than $1.20 a day rose from 55% to 70%.
More aid is going to the Palestinian territories occupied by Israel than ever before, yet this has not offset the impact of border restrictions that amount, the charities contend, to “collective punishment against ordinary men, women, and children.”
Food prices have risen substantially, but the most acute shortages are of fuel, electricity, and spare parts for the energy infrastructure. Hospitals in the Gaza Strip have grid power cuts for 8-12 hours a day. The shortfall can sometimes be managed with hospital generators, but these have only a third of the diesel necessary to meet that need. Gaza’s diesel is supplied by the European Union, but Israel limits shipments to 2.2 million litres a week.
The chronic shortage of electricity has left more than a quarter of Gazan homes without running water and prevents treatment of sewage: more than 30 million litres is being pumped untreated into the sea every day.
The number of travel permits given by Israel to Palestinians in Gaza who are seeking medical treatment abroad also declined throughout 2007. In January 2007, 89.3% of applications were approved, but by December the proportion had fallen to a record low of 64.3%.
The possession of a permit still does not guarantee passage through Israeli border checkpoints. According to monitoring by the World Health Organization, 27 permit holders were denied passage in October 2007. Twenty patients unable to access referral services died between October and December 2007.
The report urges the United Kingdom and the European Union to pressure Israel to ease its border restrictions and urges Israel to widen its definition of essential humanitarian aid to include fuel and essential spare parts. It rejects Israeli officials’ argument that Israel is no longer legally bound by the legal responsibilities of an occupying power since withdrawing its forces to the Gaza perimeter in 2005. Noting that Israel still maintains effective control of the Gaza Strip, the charities contend that Israel’s embargo is breaching the fourth Geneva Convention.
The report also calls on all parties to cease attacks against civilians, and for Israeli and European representatives to open direct negotiations with Hamas.
Christian Aid’s director, Daleep Mukarji, said, “The UK government should acknowledge that a new strategy is needed for Gaza. The current policy does not secure vital security for Israeli citizens, and even if it did the blockade policy would still be unacceptable and illegal.”
The Israeli embassy’s spokesman Lior Ben-Dor denied that Gaza is experiencing a humanitarian crisis and said that Israel has no legal responsibility for the civil population there since its disengagement policy was implemented two years ago.
“Nevertheless,” he added, “we don’t want to see unnecessary suffering there because we have nothing against the people of Gaza, only its government that keeps attacking us.”
He noted that Gaza’s Palestinian patients allowed into Israel are usually treated at Ashkelon, which has come under rocket fire in recent days. The main Israeli power station that supplies electricity to Gaza is also at Ashkelon. The grounds of both facilities have been hit by rockets launched from Gaza in recent weeks.
“The number of patients allowed to cross is not as many as we might like,” said Mr Ben-Dor. “But the checkpoints often have to be closed because terrorists are trying to blow them up. Even EU observers fled the Rafah checkpoint in fear of their lives in the recent Gaza coup by Hamas.” He added that Hamas sometimes attacks Israeli truck drivers. “It may be that they want to impose suffering on their own people to draw international condemnation of Israel.”
He noted that Gaza’s border with Egypt is not under Israeli control. “What crosses there is between them and the Egyptians.”
The Gaza Strip: a Humanitarian Implosion is at www.careinternational.org.uk/?lid=10886.