“We have a massive 60-day plan to increase food supplies, distribute one million meals a day, start rebuilding health care, put up tents for the winter and get hundreds of thousands of children back to school,” Fletcher said.
The Deputy Secretary-General and Head of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) visited Gaza City on Saturday.
“I was here seven or eight months ago, most of the buildings were still standing, but now a large part of the city is just a wasteland,” the OCHA chief added.
Gaza, the largest city in the Palestinian territory, was largely destroyed in the latest Israeli offensive launched in mid-September.
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Israeli troops withdrew from the city on October 10, as part of the ceasefire in force from that date.
Cease-fire. The inflow of aid is one of the conditions
One of the elements of the agreement is to increase the inflow of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip. Approximately 600 aid trucks should arrive there daily
There has been significant progress in the flow of humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip, Eri Kaneko, spokeswoman for OCHA, said on October 12. She added that for the first time since March, Israel has allowed gas deliveries to cookers. The transports also include flour, fruit, meat and medical equipment.
Problems delivering help
However, the Associated Press reports that transports continue to encounter difficulties due to the closure of some border crossings and restrictions on aid organizations.
According to UN data, 339 trucks were unloaded on Friday. The Israeli Defense Ministry said 950 shipments were carried out on Thursday and 716 on Wednesday.
The head of the union of private transport companies in Gaza, Nahed Shehaiber, told the AP that even though there has not been a significant increase in the number of transports since the ceasefire, the security situation has improved, which prevents gangs from looting aid.
Fletcher stressed that the challenges in delivering aid are enormous and called for more border crossings to be opened to increase the inflow of aid.
Israel will not open the border crossing at Rafah
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's office said on Saturday that Israel will not open the border crossing between the Gaza Strip and Egypt in Rafah for now.
The border point, closed for many months, was to be opened as part of the ceasefire. Israel emphasized that The condition is that Hamas will return the bodies of all killed hostages.
The Gaza Strip is devastated by a war that has lasted over two years. According to UN data, 83 percent are damaged or destroyed. all buildings, more than half of which are completely destroyed or seriously damaged.
There is a humanitarian crisis on an unprecedented scale on Palestinian territory. Since the beginning of the conflict, Israeli attacks have destroyed civilian infrastructure, including hospitals, schools and waterworks.
At the end of August, the UN-backed Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) announced for the first time that there was famine in parts of the Gaza Strip, which may spread to other areas.
Most of the approximately 2.1 million inhabitants of the Gaza Strip have become internally displaced persons, living in tent cities.
The number of Palestinians killed in the conflict exceeded 68,000 on Saturday. people, said the Gaza Strip's health ministry, which is controlled by Hamas.
