Opening of safe humanitarian corridors and de-escalation of hostilities, crucial to alleviate suffering of millions in Gaza, says ActionAid
Opening of safe humanitarian corridors and de-escalation of hostilities, crucial to alleviate suffering of millions in Gaza, says ActionAid.
As the escalation of hostilities continues unabated in Gaza, ActionAid is concerned at the intensified humanitarian situation, where over two million people are facing a humanitarian crisis. The siege announced earlier this week has left people without reliable access to food, fuel, electricity, and water. Today, the Gaza power authority has said that the sole power station has stopped working. This means people are without electricity and fuel, and critically hospitals - already running out of crucial medical supplies - unable to provide vital, lifesaving health services.
“We are deeply saddened by the unfolding humanitarian situation in Gaza and are calling for the urgent creation of UN humanitarian corridors to get aid through to desperate citizens especially women and children, and key public services, like hospitals which are already overwhelmed by people requiring urgent medical attention,” said Arthur Larok, Secretary General of ActionAid International.
“The conditions are unprecedented in the history of our humanitarian work. What is happening in Gaza is continuous bombing, and blockages to food, water, medicine, fuel and electricity due to the siege. Hospitals are full of patients and injured and they are in danger under horrific humanitarian conditions and lack of basic services. Medical staff and ambulances are being directly targeted. There are more than 263,000 people who are internally displaced,” said Amjad Al-Shawa of the Palestinian NGOs Network in Gaza.
The people in Gaza have been under a sixteen-year-old air, road, and sea blockade that has made it difficult to access basic human needs and services. The latest siege has worsened the conditions of already strained public infrastructure.
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Notes to editor
Spokespeople are available:
Nadim Zaghloul - ActionAid Palestine Country Director in the West Bank
Wisam Shweiki - Head of Programmes at ActionAid Palestine, in the West Bank
Cristina Muñoz - Director at ActionAid Spain, in Madrid
Gemma Cosialls - Country Manager at ActionAid Spain in Jerusalem
Samah Kassab - Project Manager, in Gaza
Razmi Farook - Director of Asia and Humanitarian at ActionAid International, in Colombo
Contact the ActionAid press office on media-enquiries@actionaid.org; +44 7586107955 or +263776665065.
About ActionAid
ActionAid is a global federation working with more than 41 million people living in more than 71 of the world’s poorest countries. We want to see a just, fair, and sustainable world, in which everybody enjoys the right to a life of dignity, and freedom from poverty and oppression. We work to achieve social justice and gender equality and to eradicate poverty.
ActionAid has been working in the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt) for many years supporting Palestinian people living without access to basic services and the most fundamental human rights and freedoms.
