Abu Zayd: Israeli siege takes Gaza back to the Middle Ages

Karen Abu Zayd, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) commissioner general, has warned that the 24-month-old Israeli siege on the Gaza Strip was bringing Gaza back to the Middle Ages.

 

Abu Zayd was addressing a conference organized by UNRWA in Brussels over the past couple of days in cooperation with the Belgian foreign ministry and the European Commission on the 60th anniversary of the founding of the Agency.

 

Life in Gaza witnesses unprecedented difficult conditions that may not have existed in the Middle Ages, she added.

 

The commissioner general said that there have been neither adequate fuel supplies to Gaza”s sole electricity station nor cooking gas supplies since the war ended in January.

 

She charged the Israeli occupation authority (IOA) with banning UNRWA and other humanitarian organizations from assisting thousands of families in reconstructing their destroyed homes.

 

The international official noted that 52,000 houses in Gaza were destroyed while 250,000 refugees were homeless, stressing that the world community is responsible for imposing respect to international laws and doctrines concerning rights of civilians under occupation.

 

Abu Zayd said that smuggling goods via tunnels was averting a total collapse of the humanitarian conditions in the beleaguered Strip.