The UN food agency is closing all of its bakeries in the Gaza Strip, officials said Tuesday, as food supplies dwindle after Israel sealed the territory off from all imports nearly a month ago, reports UNB.
Israel, which tightened its blockade and later resumed its offensive in order to pressure Hamas into accepting changes to their ceasefire agreement, said that enough food entered Gaza during the six-week truce to sustain the territory's roughly 2 million Palestinians.
Markets largely emptied weeks ago, and UN agencies say the supplies they built up during the truce are running out. Gaza is heavily reliant on international aid, because the war has destroyed almost all of its food production capability.
Mohammed al-Kurd, a father of 12, said that his children go to bed without dinner.
“We tell them to be patient and that we will bring flour in the morning,” he said. “We lie to them and to ourselves.”
A World Food Program memo circulated to aid groups on Monday said that it could no longer operate its remaining bakeries, which produce the pita bread on which many rely. The UN agency said that it was prioritizing its remaining stocks to provide emergency food aid and expand hot meal distribution. WFP spokespeople didn't immediately respond to requests for comment.
Olga Cherevko, a spokesperson for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, said that the WFP was closing its remaining 19 bakeries after shuttering six others last month. She said that hundreds of thousands of people relied on them.
The Israeli military body in charge of Palestinian affairs, known as COGAT, said that more than 25,000 trucks entered Gaza during the ceasefire, carrying nearly 450,000 tons of aid. It said that amount represented around a third of what has entered during the entire war.
“There is enough food for a long period of time, if Hamas lets the civilians have it,” it said.
UN agencies and aid groups say that they struggled to bring in and distribute aid before the ceasefire took hold in January. Their estimates for how much aid actually reached people in Gaza were consistently lower than COGAT’s, which were based on how much entered through border crossings.
Bd-Pratidin English/ AM
