Act to Prevent a humanitarian catastrophe in the Gaza Strip
The tiny Gaza Strip, home to more than 2 million people, has for 14 years been cut off from the outside world by a blockade imposed by Israel with the backing of the U.S. For 6 months, Gazan authorities managed to hold the Corona virus at bay by confining people who arrived at Gaza’s borders to quarantine centers for 2 or 3 weeks.
On August 24, the first cases of ‘community spread’ of the virus were detected in Gaza and since then there have been at least 2 deaths from Covid-19 and hundreds of additional cases.
Why is this a looming catastrophe?
In 2012 the UN warned that the Gaza Strip would be ‘unlivable’ by 2020 given the destruction of much of its essential infrastructure and economic life, contamination of over 95% of its water supply, and draconian restrictions imposed by the blockade.
Today there is an enormous potential for a rampant epidemic in one of the most densely crowded places on earth where there is virtually no clean water, where electricity has been reduced to only a few hours a day given Israel’s latest restriction on the entry of fuel, and where the health care system is severely overstretched. On August 27th the World Health Organization reported there was a critical shortage of medicines, testing kits, essential lab supplies and screening equipment in Gaza, and only 86 ventilators, most of which were already being used by non-Covid patients. There are now more than 300 cases of community spread. On top of all this, Israel has been bombing Gaza daily during the last three weeks of August.
Tell our elected representatives to let Gaza live!
Warning of an impending humanitarian collapse, the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights on August 27 called on the international community to:
- force Israeli authorities to end the unjust closure and abandon the policy of collective punishment imposed on the Gaza Strip.
- intervene to ensure the import of food, fuel, clean water and medical supplies urgently needed to sustain life and avoid a humanitarian catastrophe.
TAKE ACTION: Send this message to your Members of Congress!
Prepared by MASSACHUSETTS AGAINST ISRAELI ANNEXATION which includes the following organizations:
Alliance for Water Justice in Palestine * Arlington United for Justice with Peace * Boston College Students for Justice in Palestine * Dorchester People for Peace * Jewish Voice for Peace-Boston * Human Rights Awareness: Palestine Israel/CD3 * Massachusetts Peace Action * Merrimack Valley People for Peace * North Shore Coalition for Peace and Justice * Middle East Peace and Justice Coalition of Western Mass * Palestinian Community in Boston * Tree of Life Educational Fund * Unitarian Universalists for Justice in the Middle East, MA Chapter