JERUSALEM, March 1: Stocks of wheat, sugar and cooking oil are dwindling in Gaza and could begin to run out within days unless Israel reopens the strip’s main crossing point for goods, UN officials said on Wednesday.
David Shearer, head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, said humanitarian conditions had deteriorated since the Jan 25 Palestinian election, which the Hamas won by a landslide.
The United Nations attributed the growing problems to Israel’s closure of the main crossing into Gaza at Karni and other security measures. “This is getting to precarious levels,” Mr Shearer said.
Israeli officials defended their closure of Karni as a security precaution against possible Palestinian attacks and said they offered to reroute supplies to Gaza through another crossing, an offer the Palestinians declined.
But as international pressure mounted on Wednesday, Israel signalled that Karni would reopen as early as Thursday.
Israel closed the crossing for 21 days between Jan 15 and Feb 5. It was closed again on Feb 21 after a mysterious explosion in the area and has remained closed because of ‘continued security alerts’, an army spokeswoman said.
Israel has halted tax revenue transfers to the Palestinian Authority and has asked donor nations to freeze all but humanitarian aid to pressure Hamas, which will form the next government, to ‘renounce violence’, recognise the Jewish state, and abide by interim peace deals.
“It is not our policy to punish the Palestinians, not at all,” Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni told a press conference in Vienna.
Though no final decisions have been made, diplomatic sources involved in discussions with the army over Karni said the commercial terminal was expected to reopen on Thursday.
“There are preparations underway for the opening of the (Karni) crossing in the near future, within the next few days,” an Israeli military official said.
SUPPLIES LOW: Israel ended its 38-year military rule of the Gaza Strip last year, but retains control of all access points for bringing goods in and out of the territory, citing security concerns.
Mr Shearer said sugar stocks would begin to run out in Gaza in as little as two or three days unless Karni was reopened.
Sugar prices have risen by more than 25 per cent because of Israel’s frequent closure of the crossing point, Mr Shearer said.
Supplies of wheat flour to make bread, Gaza’s main staple, will begin to run out in as little as four days unless truckloads of wheat are let in, Mr Shearer said.
Shortages in Gaza have become so acute that aid programmes are starting to be affected, said Arnold Vercken, the Gaza and West Bank representative for the World Food Programme, which delivers wheat flour to 146,000 out of some 1.3 million Gazans.
“For the time being, we are on hold,” Mr Vercken said.
Mr Vercken said even though the daily flow of basic commodities into Gaza had stopped, ‘we’re not talking famine’ as many Gaza households have private stocks of wheat flour that could last a month or longer. But with dwindling supplies and prices on the rise, poorer Gazans will be hardest hit, he said.
Mr Vercken said wheat mills in Gaza normally try to keep on hand between 26,000 and 30,000 tons of wheat — two months’ supply — but are now down to their last 1,200 tons of wheat.
Palestinians depend on foreign aid totalling more than $1 billion a year. It is unclear how much of that money would be withheld by international donors once Hamas, whose charter calls for Israel’s destruction, forms a government.
Since a Palestinian revolt erupted in 2000, Hamas has masterminded at least 60 suicide bombings against Israelis. But it has largely abided by a truce declared last year. —Reuters
