Heathlander – Gaza reduced to bare survival.
Israel continues its barbaric blockade of Gaza. The children of Gaza suffer along with the sick and elderly. To what end? What god would approve of this:
Reserves of food have long been depleted and the meagre quantities allowed into Gaza are not even enough to meet the immediate needs. Families never know if they will have food for their children the following day.When people do have food, they generally have no cooking gas or electricity with which to cook it. Last week, less than 10 per cent of the weekly requirement of cooking gas was allowed into Gaza.
and…
Shortages of fuel, electricity and spare parts are causing water and sanitation infrastructure and other crucial services to deteriorate a bit more every day. Eighty per cent of the wells are now only functioning at reduced capacity and water supply is only available for a few hours every few days…
Routine blackouts disrupt every aspect of life for everyone. Hospitals are struggling to power life-saving machinery and it is ever more difficult to maintain laundry and other essential services.”
and…
“The fuel for hospital generators has nearly run out and a shortage of basic medical supplies has left Al-Shiffa [Gaza’s main health-care centre] with only 20 percent of the oxygen supply it needs, forcing medical professionals in Gaza to make hard choices, said Gaza health ministry spokesperson Hamam Nasman.
“Fifty percent of hospital equipment at Al-Shiffa has stopped functioning due to the lack of electricity and spare parts since this more than 20-day blockade started,” said Gaza health minister Basem Naim, adding that 95 basic medications are out of stock.
Asthma patients waiting for inhalers are being turned away, as hospital pharmacists scavenge local pharmacies.
and…
According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), Gaza is running on less than half the electricity it requires for normal consumption, a result of the blockade on fuel and mechanical parts.
The lack of fuel and electricity has caused water and sewage systems in Gaza to collapse.
The Coastal Municipal Water Utility (CMWU) in Gaza has said that due to the power outages and the lack of fuel, 20 percent of wells are not functional and 60 percent are only partially functional. Furthermore, malfunctioning sewage systems have raised concerns about possible flooding and leakage during the forthcoming rainy season.”
Inhumanity as policy:
Here’s an example of the pre-meditated cruelty of US/Israeli policy:
“Karima Abu Dalal, a 34-year-old mother of five young children, died on 25 November. She suffered from Hodgkin’s lymphoma, a cancer of the lymph glands that is curable in more than 90 per cent of cases. She was denied access to the treatment she desperately needed as Israel refused her a permit to travel to the hospital in Nablus in the West Bank in November 2007.
In a medical report accompanying her permit request an Israeli cancer specialist had written: “This is a young woman who will die in the absence of treatment and with treatment her chances of recovery are excellent” (underlined in the original).
The Israeli authorities nonetheless refused to let her leave Gaza and the Israeli High Court of Justice refused to intervene. Earlier this year, she eventually managed to leave Gaza to Egypt as an exceptional case, but by then her condition had deteriorated irreparably and she returned to Gaza to be with her family. Subsequent requests for her to travel to Israel to receive at least palliative care to relieve her pain were in vain.”
According to Amnesty, “scores of people” have died because Israel has refused them access to medical treatment.
Summary of despair:
A desperate civilian population, mostly children, suffering what human rights organisations describe as an “unprecedented … humanitarian implosion” has been trapped in one of the most densely populated areas on the planet and relentlessly bombed, immiserated and starved for nearly three years (to take just the latest broad phase in Israel’s occupation policy). Now Israel, in full view, is progressively reducing its access to food, fuel, electricity, medicines, sanitation and even water. Yes, it’s an “an assault on human dignity”, it’s a war crime, it’s collective punishment. But somehow none of those terms fully capture the cold-blooded deliberateness of the crime. An entire people has been intentionally reduced to “abject destitution” – Israel and the `international community’ have pursued policies designed to create one of the worst humanitarian crises on the planet, in order to punish an occupied population for voting the wrong way and to consolidate Israel’s control over territory it illegitimately occupies.
Gaza Implosion – Read what we support with our tax dollars.
Cut these people a break. At long last cut these people a freaking break.
