Gaza Fuel-Shortage Pushes United Nations to Step In to Keep Infrastructure Running
Image by Getty Images
The United Nations began distributing fuel in Gaza to keep critical infrastructure running, an official said.
“Fuel is actually coming in, as of today, through the Kerem Shalom,” a border crossing with Israel, U.N. Middle East Special Coordinator Robert Serry told a news conference in northern Gaza Thursday.
The fuel, he told the AFP news agency, was purchased by UNRWA, the United Nation’s agency for working with Palestinian refugees, he added.
“That doesn’t resolve the fuel crisis in Gaza, but it does provide a safety net, we hope, for the coming two to three months for those critical installations here,” he said.
Serry’s announcement came as the Islamist Hamas-run Palestinian territory suffers the most serious fuel crisis in its history, with daily power outages of up to 16 hours, AFP reports.
Hugh Robertson, the minister responsible for the Middle East at Britain’s Foreign Office, said in a statement that, “It is profoundly disappointing that the living conditions for the 1.7 million civilians inside Gaza have, if anything, deteriorated.
“We call on the Israeli, Egyptian and Palestinian authorities to work together to ensure that the efforts to shut down smuggling tunnels are accompanied by equally determined efforts to open up legal trade,” he said.
On Nov. 1, Hamas’s energy authority announced that Gaza’s sole power plant, which supplies 30 percent of its electricity needs, had stopped working because there was not enough fuel to power it.
The shortage has resulted in the shutdown of sewage treatment facilities.
Hamas has blamed the power outage on Egypt’s destruction of cross-border tunnels used for bringing in diesel and has also accused the Western-backed Palestinian Authority of charging inflated prices for fuel.
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover. All donations are being matched by the Forward Board - up to $100,000.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
