Palestinians carry food supplies near a United Nations Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA) run warehouse in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip October 28, 2023. REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa
Juliette Touma, spokesperson for UNRWA, underscored the organization’s recent struggles in maintaining its humanitarian efforts in the densely populated Gaza Strip. She lamented the inability to distribute vital fuel to medical facilities, emphasizing the grim reality that no additional supplies had arrived on Sunday.
“These meager provisions hardly scratch the surface of the immense needs on the ground,” Touma expressed. “Our appeal is clear: we urgently require a consistent and unimpeded flow of humanitarian aid, which encompasses essential fuel, along with an increased convoy presence.”
UNRWA’s capacity to aid the beleaguered populace in Gaza has been severely strained by a series of airstrikes. Tragically, these attacks have claimed the lives of a substantial number of UNRWA personnel, surpassing fifty-nine confirmed casualties.
Touma somberly acknowledged, “This figure, though distressing, is only the fraction UNRWA has been able to corroborate. Regrettably, the actual count of lost colleagues may indeed be higher. Disturbingly, there have also been reports of individuals trapped beneath the wreckage.”
It is essential to recognize that, even before the eruption of the recent conflict, UNRWA had already sounded the alarm regarding the vulnerability of its operations due to funding shortages. Founded in the aftermath of the 1949 Arab-Israeli war, UNRWA’s mandate extends to providing public services, including educational facilities, healthcare, and essential humanitarian aid, across Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon.
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