UN:UN AGENCIES yesterday suspended or curtailed humanitarian operations in Gaza due to Israel's fuel blockade.
The UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) halted food aid to 700,000 refugees and the World Food Programme to another 127,000.
Due to the grounding of its vehicles, UNRWA also reduced operations at 214 schools serving 200,000 children and 19 health centres as well as refuse collection in eight refugee camps housing 500,000.
UNRWA's Gaza director, John Ging, said, "We've run out of fuel. We have not been supplied since the first of April ... The entire market has run out of fuel, affecting all municipal services."
Twelve municipalities have ended refuse collection, affecting half a million Gazans. Another 13 will close down within days. Public hospitals have between 33 and 170 hours of fuel left; hospitals run by non-governmental organisations have fuel for less than a week.
Vaccines for 50,000 infants are at risk of spoiling because of lack of refrigeration. Eighteen ambulances are idle; the main hospital has cancelled operations and cannot wash linen; sewage pumping plants are about to close.
Electricity and water cuts are frequent and prolonged. Irrigated crops are wilting because 70 per cent of Gaza's 4,000 agricultural wells rely on fuel-powered pumps.
Farmers have reduced cultivated acreage, quadrupling the prices of vegetables and fruits. Mills have fuel to transport flour for three days while fishermen cannot harvest fish stocks. High unemployment, an 80 per cent poverty rate, and the fuel crisis make locally produced food unaffordable for a majority of Gazans.
Salah Sakka, Gaza director of American Near East Refugee Aid, said his organisation had frozen field operations. "We have only one car operating and we have stopped our pre-school milk programme. Only a quarter of children attend school, anyway. Since many students cannot reach schools and universities, classes are held at different locations where they can take exams."
On Wednesday Israel allowed in one million litres of industrial diesel for Gaza's power station, enough to provide electricity until Sunday night. Last week, just 1.2 million litres of diesel was delivered although the plant needs 3.5 million litres a week.
Israel permitted the entry of cooking gas last week but not petrol or diesel for stand-by generators and vehicles. It says Hamas is blocking deliveries and says one million litres of petrol and diesel is stored on the Palestinian side of the Nahal Oz crossing. But this is enough for less than one day.
Reuters adds: President George Bush, trying to shore up a faltering Middle East peace process, has assured Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas that Palestinian statehood remained a high priority in his final 10 months in office.
Mr Bush held talks with Mr Abbas at the White House in the face of deepening scepticism over the chances for securing a peace deal with Israel before he finishes his term.
