Gazans Brace for Cold, Bleak and Miserable Winter

IPS - Mel Frykberg
Tens of thousands of Gazans living in tents and damaged homes face a wet, cold and miserable winter as Israel’s blockade of the coastal territory continues to prevent the importation of building and reconstruction material.

...during a tour of northern Gaza last week, the U.N. Humanitarian Coordinator for the occupied Palestinian territory, Maxwell Gaylard, and the Association of International Development Agencies (AIDA) called on Israel to open its border crossings immediately to avert a further deterioration in the humanitarian situation on the ground.

"With winter rains and cold weather now imminent, the people of Gaza are even more desperately in need of construction materials such as cement, roofing tiles and glass to build and repair homes destroyed and damaged during the Israeli military offensive of 2008/2009," said Gaylard.

..."Gaza urgently requires 268,000 square metres of glass for windows and 67,000 square metres of glass for solar water heaters or enough glass to cover more than 30 football pitches. More than 500 children are still living in tents," Mike Bailey from Oxfam told IPS.

Damage caused to Gaza’s water, sanitation and electricity systems, exacerbated by Israel’s crippling blockade which forbids the import of most essential spare parts and fuel, has further limited the ability of aid agencies to supply essential services.

..."The humanitarian situation is going to deteriorate if something doesn’t give," Gaylard told IPS during a tour of the Ezbt Abbed Rabbo area of the northern Gaza strip.

"We are reaching out to the international community. We are appealing to the member countries of the U.N. on a regular basis about this continuing crisis… We are holding discussions with the U.N. General Assembly and the U.N. Security Council. One would hope that the message would be getting out after the Goldstone report," said Gaylard.

...Fifty metres away from where the media gathered to hear the U.N. coordinator address the escalating humanitarian crisis, dozens of Gazan families were living the crisis first-hand.

Muhammad Zaid’s five-story home - which took four years to build and was home to 16 people, the youngest a one-year-old - was flattened during 15 days of intensive Israeli shelling at the beginning of the year

..."This abysmal situation can’t continue. People are desperate. Enough is enough. It is time for the blockade to be ended and for humanity to return to Gaza," Bailey told IPS. Full story