Demands escalated at the United Nations yesterday, Wednesday, to take measures to alleviate the severity of the humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip, amid warnings that most bakeries supported by humanitarian partners would stop.
The British delegate to the UN Security Council, Barbara Woodward, called on Israel to respect international humanitarian law, and asked it to take urgent measures to alleviate the severity of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
She expressed her regret at the Security Council’s failure to reach consensus on a draft resolution calling for an immediate, unconditional and permanent ceasefire in Gaza.
Woodward said that the aid reaching civilians is completely insufficient to mitigate the severity of what she described as the disaster in Gaza.
Bakery crisis
For his part, spokesman for the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Stephane Dujarric, warned of the danger that most of the bakeries in the Strip would stop producing bread, holding Israel responsible.
Dujarric said that only 7 out of 19 bakeries supported by humanitarian partners in Gaza are still working, justifying the disruption of the rest to Israeli attacks and obstacles.
In his daily press conference, Dujarric pointed out the need to pay attention to the humanitarian situation of the people of Gaza who are struggling to survive under the Israeli aggression.
Dujarric pointed out that 4 of these bakeries are located in Gaza City, 2 of which are in Deir al-Balah (center), and the last in the Khan Yunis area (south), and stated that the flour stock in these bakeries will run out soon.
Israel is responsible
Dujarric explained that the reason behind most bakeries stopping work is that Israel prevents the necessary materials from reaching them. He stressed that the delay in fuel delivery constitutes a problem in bread production, as is the case in many other issues.
Dujarric said that the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) “warns that bakeries, which constitute a lifeline for hundreds of thousands of hungry or starving Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, are on the verge of closure due to fuel shortages.”
With American support, since October 7, 2023, Israel has been waging a war on Gaza that has left more than 148,000 Palestinians martyred and wounded, most of them children and women, and more than 10,000 missing, amid massive destruction and famine that killed dozens of children and the elderly, in one of the worst humanitarian disasters in the world.
Israel continues its massacres, ignoring the Security Council resolution to end them immediately and the orders of the International Court of Justice to take measures to prevent acts of genocide and improve the catastrophic humanitarian situation in Gaza.
