Gaza is facing a man-made drought as its water systems collapse, the United Nations’ children agency said yesterday.
“Children will begin to die of thirst ... Just 40 per cent of drinking water production facilities remain functional. Without fuel, every one of these will stop operating within weeks,” Unicef spokesperson James Elder told reporters in Geneva.
“We are way below emergency standards in terms of drinking water for people in Gaza,” he added.
“If the current more than 100-day blockade on fuel coming into Gaza does not end, children will begin to die of thirst. Diseases are already advancing, and chaos is tightening its grip.”
Unicef also reported a 50pc increase in children aged six months to five years admitted for treatment of malnutrition from April to May in Gaza, and half a million people going hungry.
It said the US-backed aid distribution system run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) was “making a desperate situation worse.”
Yesterday, at least 25 people awaiting aid trucks or seeking aid were killed by Israeli fire south of Netzarim in central Gaza Strip, according to local health authorities. On Thursday, at least 51 people were killed by Israeli gunfire and military strikes, including 12 people who tried to approach a site operated by the GHF in the central Gaza Strip.
Elder, who was recently in Gaza, said he had many testimonials of women and children injured while trying to receive food aid, including a young boy who was wounded by a tank shell and later died of his injuries.
He said a lack of public clarity on when the sites, some of which are in combat zones, were open was causing mass casualty events.
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