Daoud Abu Al-Qas/Reuters
Palestinians who fled eastern Gaza City after receiving orders from Israeli forces to evacuate the neighborhood carry their belongings in Gaza City, July 7, 2024.
CNN
—
UN agencies say new evacuation orders by Israeli forces in the Gaza Strip have led to the largest displacement since October, making emergency food distribution more difficult than ever.
“Many distribution points have been forced to close. Only a few bakeries remain open. We urgently need to increase food deliveries and increase our capacity to deliver hot meals,” the World Food Programme said in a Thursday post.
A series of evacuation orders issued by the Israel Defense Forces between late June and earlier this month has increased the number of displaced people in the Gaza Strip from 1.7 million to 1.9 million, according to a UN assessment.
The WFP said this month that it had provided food assistance to more than 600,000 people in the Gaza Strip and provided food packs and flour to more than 500,000, but it also reported that it had to further reduce rations in central and southern Gaza to accommodate broader distribution for the newly displaced.
“WFP needs to deliver more fuel to bakeries and other services so they can provide emergency assistance to displaced families,” the report said. “Basic necessities are available in markets in southern and central Gaza, but many people cannot afford them; shortages mean food is being sold at exorbitant prices.”
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported on Wednesday that Israeli forces had halted all aid operations from northern Wadi Gaza to central Gaza.
“This meant that humanitarian workers were unable to reach hundreds of thousands of people in need of assistance, and it also became impossible to collect supplies from the northern entrance to Erez West,” it said.
COGAT, the Israeli agency responsible for coordinating aid deliveries in the Gaza Strip, told CNN that it was not aware of any halt to deliveries of supplies from the southern Gaza Strip through Wadi Gaza to northern areas.
Jehad Alshrafi/AP
Palestinians collect food aid ahead of the Eid al-Adha holiday scheduled for June 15, 2024, in Khan Yunis, Gaza Strip.
Gaza’s health sector remains under heavy strain: according to the World Health Organization, 15 of Gaza’s 36 hospitals are partially functional and only 1,500 of Gaza’s normal 3,500 beds are available, 600 of which are in field hospitals.
Both the International Red Cross and Gaza’s Ministry of Health highlighted the challenges of providing medical care on Thursday.
The Health Ministry said a shortage of ambulances, arrests of paramedics by the IDF and gasoline shortages have “left the ambulance and emergency system unable to respond to all requests and missions to transport the wounded.”
The Health Ministry said basic healthcare has been affected, with around 60 percent of basic medicines in short supply and many health centers damaged, especially in the southern city of Khan Yunis.
The ministry said the infection continues to spread, with about 1.7 million people infected, and there is a shortage of blood units.
One of the field hospitals under pressure is run by the International Committee of the Red Cross in Rafah, which is reaching capacity due to “repeated heavy casualties,” the ICRC said on Thursday, noting that children had required treatment for shrapnel wounds from Saturday’s attack in Al Mawashi.
“The huge influx of wounded people on Saturday and the number of patients who had to be resuscitated is unimaginable,” said Dr Pankaj Jaldiyal of the ICRC.
