The UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) warned this Tuesday that it will be forced to suspend operations in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday night due to lack of fuel.
“If we do not urgently obtain fuel, we will be forced to stop our operations in the Gaza Strip starting tomorrow. [quarta-feira] at night,” the agency warned on X (formerly Twitter), on the 18th day of the war between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement in the enclave.
@OOPS Warning: If we do not get fuel urgently, we will be forced to stop our operations in the #Gaza Strip starting tomorrow night.
@UNITED NATIONS agency says it is #Loop The operation will end tomorrow ‘if we don’t get fuel’@JulietteTouma @BBC News https://t.co/JfQLPwmSGb
– OOPS (@OOPS) October 24, 2023
UNRWA spokesperson Tamara al-Rifai told the BBC on Tuesday that if the agency does not receive fuel in the next few hours, it will not be able to work or collect aid arriving through the Rafah crossing, which has been opened to the public. entrance of 20 people. trucks transporting humanitarian material.
“We need fuel for our water desalination plants, so that people can have access to clean water. Hospitals need fuel for the machines, which save lives,” said Al Rifai, calling the situation “frustrating.”
UNRWA warned on Sunday that it only had enough fuel to continue operating for another three days. “Without fuel there will be no water, no hospitals, no bakeries. Without fuel, aid will not reach those who need it so much,” said UNRWA Commissioner General Philippe Lazzarini.
On October 7, militias from the Islamic movement Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007, entered Israeli territory and launched thousands of rockets. In reaction, Israel launched a forceful military response.
On Tuesday, Palestinian health authorities said 5,300 people were killed, 2,055 of them children, and around 18,000 injured in Israeli retaliation attacks on Gaza, sparked by the incursion of Hamas militants into the Jewish state.
For its part, Hamas, an Islamist movement that has controlled Gaza since 2007 and that the European Union (EU) and the United States consider a “terrorist group,” reported this Tuesday that almost 5,800 Palestinians had died.
In the West Bank, clashes with Israeli forces and settlers have killed another 95 Palestinians, 28 of them children, in the past two weeks.
According to official Israeli sources, around 1,400 people have been killed in Israel since October 7, the vast majority following Hamas attacks.
Source: TSF
