Painting a grim picture of the current social climate in the Middle East, the United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator today urged donors meeting in Stockholm to address the severe suffering of Palestinians living under occupation. Mr. Egeland, reflecting on more than two decades of travel to the region, said he had never felt such a sense of disillusionment, despair and hatred as on his last mission there in July. Calling the situation in Gaza severe, he said a cessation of hostilities and the release of the captured Israeli soldiers were needed. The humanitarian community also needed better access to Gaza, he added. Read more about UN aid chief urges action to stem suffering in Occupied Palestinian Territories
International agency Oxfam is calling on donor governments, meeting in Stockholm Friday, to resume international aid to the Palestinian Authority in order to address the deteriorating humanitarian situation in the occupied Palestinian Territories. Oxfam believes that the Palestinian Authority stands to lose more than $1 billion following the suspension of aid earlier this year and Israel withholding Palestinian tax revenue, according to UN and World Bank estimates. Oxfam says that Palestinians are being pushed into deep poverty as a result. Hundreds of thousands of people have been left without an income. Rubbish is piling in the streets, sewage is overflowing. Read more about Oxfam calls on world leaders to lift Palestinian aid freeze at Stockholm conference
The Palestinian Health Ministry is facing a growing financial crisis as well as a humanitarian crisis, the World Health Organization (WHO) warned ahead of the Stockholm donor conference on the humanitarian situation in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The health component of the revised UN humanitarian appeal for the territory is critically underfunded despite growing humanitarian needs, especially in Gaza. The situation in the West Bank and Gaza Strip has been deteriorating due to a severe funding crisis and the recent escalation of violence, on top of five years of the Intifada. Israel’s actions have had an extremely negative impact on the health of the Palestinian people. Read more about Palestinian Health Ministry in financial crisis, World Health Organization warns
In a serious escalation of an ongoing health crisis in the West Bank and Gaza, health sector workers went on strike on Tuesday in protest of unpaid wages. “The strike is paralysing all primary health care centres that provide maternal and child health services,” said Usama Al Najjar, head of the Health Professions Union. “And all kinds of children’s vaccinations have completely stopped.” Al Najjar said that if the strike goes on for long, some 300,000 children under the age of three who receive regular vaccinations will suffer. Government health workers, who number 13,000 in the occupied Palestinian territories (oPt), have been unpaid for the past six months, said Al Najjar. Read more about Strikes paralyse Palestinian health sector
Palestinian parents are huddling on street corners, in cafes and in mosques and talking nervously about the looming crisis in their children’s education. The five month long financial blockade on the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority (PA) is now threatening to shut down the education system. With an alarmingly high unemployment rate of 40 per cent and most civil servants, including most teachers without paychecks for five months now, few households can afford the expense of sending the students back to school when the summer holidays end. Read more about International blockades threaten Palestinian schools
Gaza hospitals are facing a crisis because of a western and Israeli economic boycott, and an Israeli military offensive. The United Nations has warned of an increasingly desperate humanitarian situation. “The siege and closure imposed by Israel have hindered medical aid from Jordan, Qatar, the Red Cross and the EU from reaching us,” said Dr Ma’awiya Hasanein, general manager of the emergency section in the Ministry of Health in the Gaza Strip. Gaza is a Palestinian-administered strip of land bordering Israel and Egypt. It was fully occupied by Israel from 1967 until mid-2005, when it was handed over to the Palestinian National Authority (PNA). Read more about Gaza siege causing major health crisis
The nearly two-month long Israeli military operation in the Gaza Strip continues to exact a heavy toll on the 1.4 million Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip. Two hundred and two (202) Palestinians, including 44 children have been killed since 28 June, when ‘Operation Summer Rains’ (the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) name for the offensive) began. One IDF soldier has been killed and 26 Israelis injured in the same period. Read more about Palestinian death toll reaches 202 as 'Operation Summer Rains' extends into its tenth week
Briefing the Security Council today on the situation of Palestinians in the Middle East, the top United Nations political officer painted a grim picture of developments over the past 12 months, warning that the vision of Israel and Palestine living peacefully side-by-side has slipped “further away,” and stressing the need for a renewed international effort in the region. In an open meeting of the Council, which also heard speeches from almost 30 countries, the Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs, Ibrahim Gambari, listed six main reasons why the situation had changed so much from a year ago. Read more about UN official paints grim picture of Palestinian situation
NABLUS — Five months after an international embargo was imposed on the Palestinian National Authority (PNA), the West Bank is facing a health crisis as pharmaceuticals and medical supplies become increasingly scarce. “We’re facing severe shortages of 13 important drugs,” said Dr Lou’ay Shaheen, head of the cancer ward at the National Hospital in Nablus. “In the past two weeks, nine of these drugs were made available, but quantities still aren’t sufficient for all the patients.” Read more about Nablus: Patients pay the price of embargo
The water point in the southern Gaza town of Joret al Lout is the only place to get drinkable water for the more than 10,000 people who live there. Half of those in the poor and densely populated community are children. Many can be seen at the water point, filling bottles and jerry cans. Children like Mahmoud Abdullah, 13, help as best they can with the severe shortage of safe water. “We are filling water bottles because we have no drinkable water at home, and if water is available it is salty,” says Mahmoud. People in Joret al Lout have not had drinkable running water in their homes since 28 June, when the region’s only power plant was bombed. Read more about Crisis worsens Gaza's already severe water shortage
