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Middle East
Food running out in Gaza as aid appeal fails
2003-02-11
More than a million Palestinians, already suffering economic collapse, growing unemployment and malnutrition levels comparable to those in Congo, are threatened with food shortages because western governments have turned their backs on a UN appeal for funds. The UN Palestinian refugee agency Unrwa says its plea for about £60m to feed 1.1m people in the occupied territories has fallen flat, even though the intifada and Israeli retaliation have driven Palestinians to new depths of poverty.
This is not going to make my sympathy meter twitch, I just know it. The Paleos are reaping what they've sown.
The people of Gaza, trapped behind barbed wire backed by Israeli guns, are the worst off. Unrwa says the warehouses will be empty within weeks.
Or sooner, depending on when the riots start.
Its commissioner general, Peter Hansen, said: "If we don't get money coming in soon we will have a rupture in the food distribution which will be very serious, as we already have malnutrition levels of 22% among children, and that is bound to rise if food aid stops." Two years ago Unrwa fed about 11,000 people in the Gaza Strip, mostly widows and those with no means of support. Today it feeds 715,000: more than half the population.
The other half are building bombs.
Even so nearly one in four are malnourished, it says. The children's agency, Unicef, says child malnutrition is comparable to Congo and Zimbabwe.
Funny how some tactics in Zimbabwe and Gaza are the same.
Unrwa says it needs $94m immediately for food but has had only one promise, $1.5m from Switzerland, and not a penny in hard cash. Mr Hansen said: "It's going to increase tension, and be very difficult to keep things under whatever control there is at the moment. It's going to be politically very destabilising."
Just exactly what isn't destabilizing in Gaza?
The people who live there call Gaza a prison camp.
Truer words ...

The UN says it is the most crowded place on earth, and rapidly becoming one of the poorest. "These past two years are the worst for Gaza since the occupation began in 1967," Abdalhadi Abu Khousa, head of the Gaza section of the Union of Palestinian Medical Relief Committees, said. More than 30% of the children are suffering from anaemia, the direct result of a lack of nutrition, which in turn springs directly from the lack of employment, Mr Hansen said.

"But it's not just unemployment and disease. There's no hope. No hope for the peace process. No hope for the future. No hope the Israelis will accept us as human beings. These are the worst times Gaza has seen."
There's a reason why the Israelis won't accept you as human beings. You've been sending your young people to blow themselves up amongst Israeli civilians. But this gets back to that cause and effect problem mentioned to you guys in the past.
The decline has been rapid. For years agricultural exports and jobs in Israel made the economy boom. When the intifada began two years ago about 70,000 Gazans went to work in Israel, many as building labourers or in Jewish settlements. Now only 15,000 day permits to enter Israel are issued.
And it's going to get worse.
Aqil Abu Shammala, the refugee who heads the UN's social services programme in Gaza, says the result is a rapid decline into poverty. "We had very many things: cars, furniture, travel. We had five or six years that were very good," he said. "From the beginning of the intifada, step by step, labourers working in Israel were dismissed. People were forced to spend their savings. Month after month their savings were whittled away. Many sold their furniture and now they have nothing left to sell: 90% of labourers lost their jobs.
Tell me Aqil, do you understand cause and effect now?
"A teacher told me that previously if you asked the children in class who needed aid for the poor, they were ashamed to receive it. Now the children are keen to register their names.

"Poverty is so pervasive that it has ceased to be a stigma."
A lot of things have ceased to be a stigma in Gaza, like suicide/murder bombing.
Desperation has driven men to risk their lives in search of work. Five cousins from the al-Astal family in Khan Younis refugee camp were killed trying to climb the fence to find jobs in Israel. Among them was Muhammad al-Astal, 21. "I told him not to do it," his wife Doa said.

"But we have a little girl, she is only a year old and he said he must go and find work so he can look after her properly. He said that is a husband's duty."

The Israeli army did not try to arrest them: it blew them to bits with a tank shell.
They have been kinda twitchy that way lately. Can you think of a reason why, Doa?
"Everyone knows about the cousins," said Amal Masri, a social worker in Khan Younis. "We live with so much here. The poverty, the constant noise of the tanks. You never sleep properly.

"But what happened to the al-Astal men sickened a lot of people. They weren't trying to hurt anyone, they were just trying to feed their children."
You're a social worker, Amal. You were trained in sociology. Do you understand cause and effect?
Mr Hansen is reluctant to say that funds are not forthcoming because donors are worried that a war on Iraq will cost billions of dollars in emergency aid and reconstruction costs. But others in the UN do so.
We'll help those who are grateful to be liberated and promise to live in peace. Catch the wave, fellas.
The British Department for International Development is one of the biggest donors to the Palestinians. Yesterday the secretary of state, Clare Short, said Britain had already increased its annual support to the Palestinians to £32m, and more would be forthcoming. "This is a humanitarian crisis and help must be provided to keep people going," she said. "But this crisis will not be resolved without a political solution."
Back to the old "we must solve Palestine first" mantra.
Some say that if Israel insists on occupying Palestinian territory it should take responsibility for the welfare of the residents. Mr Hansen says he has tried that avenue and failed.

"We have asked the Israelis for a great many things, but apart from a consignment of rice they have given nothing.

"Instead, they have caused very great costs by destroying several of our installations and hindering us in doing our work."
Don't let the boomers and splodydopes into your buildings and you shouldn't have any problems.
Posted by:Steve White

#8  Reaping what they've sowed, there's simply no other way to put this. They had their chance 2.5 years ago, coulda got 95% of what they wanted, things were going good, but then...well, when you go along with hotheads, fools, and corrupt morons this is what you get. And where ARE the Arab brothers? Not like they're short on cash. They certainly have plenty for madrassas, AK's and C4. As if more evidence was neeeded (not), once again the "brothers" are shown for what they are...The Saudis, Libyans, Iraqis, Iranians, gulf states, all the ones with the petrodollars could give a crap about the Palestinians. Never have, never will.
Posted by: R. McLeod   2003-02-12 00:55:54  

#7  We missed our chance. We shudda chipped in for one-way tickets to the Haj for these poor folks and let the Soddy's show them the traditional Arab hospitality.
Wudda killed two birds with one stone, no?
Posted by: The Kid   2003-02-11 13:54:52  

#6  I quite agree. There is a *steady* flow of muslim charities money pouring into Gaza (the EU funding mostly the PA), channeled primarily through the Hamas-related humanitarian orgs. Still, all this has negligible effects because its main intent is to fuel terror and strenghten the holy men's influence, not too really improve the situation.
Posted by: Anonymous   2003-02-11 10:51:43  

#5  Sorry, forgot to attach this:
http://www.arabnews.com/Article.asp?ID=22674
Posted by: Tom   2003-02-11 10:34:49  

#4  Lest we forget, the Saudi royals are sponsoring 1,000 relatives of Palestinian martyrs at the Haj this week. Perhaps they should have sent food instead.
Posted by: Tom   2003-02-11 10:29:17  

#3  Good point, bernardz. Might be good if instead of constantly whining about the plight of their so-called Palestinian brothers that they actually do something about it. And funding suicide bombers next of kin don't count.
Posted by: tu3031   2003-02-11 08:40:04  

#2  Brother arabs are obviously not helping them out.
Posted by: bernardz   2003-02-11 03:34:33  

#1  I quite agree. There is a *steady* flow of muslim charities money pouring into Gaza (the EU funding mostly the PA), channeled primarily through the Hamas-related humanitarian orgs. Still, all this has negligible effects because its main intent is to fuel terror and strenghten the holy men's influence, not too really improve the situation.
Posted by: Anonymous   2/11/2003 10:51:43 AM  

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