Gaza’s sole power station shuts down, Gaza city plunges into darkness

The sole power generation station in the Gaza Strip on Saturday evening shut down after it ran out of fuel necessary to operate it, plunging Gaza city into complete darkness, Kanan Obeid the chairman of Gaza energy authority announced.

He said that large areas of the Strip would suffer total blackout by sunset, adding that 60% of the entire Strip areas would be out of electricity with Gaza city bearing the major brunt.

Obeid said that areas supplied directly by power from Israel and Egypt would be spared the power outage, noting that these areas are limited.

The chairman said that the power station did not have any reserve fuel, warning of a humanitarian disaster in the event the crisis continued and Israeli blocked entry of fuel shipments.