JERUSALEM – The UN agency for Palestinian refugees warned Monday its operations in war-torn Gaza would shut down within two days due to fuel shortages as fighting rages between Israel and Hamas.
“The humanitarian operation in Gaza will grind to a halt in the next 48 hours as no fuel is allowed to enter Gaza,” UNRWA’s Gaza chief Thomas White wrote on X, formerly Twitter.
“No fuel has entered Gaza since October 7,” he wrote, referring to the date when Hamas members stormed across the border and killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians and kidnapped some 240 others.
Israel hit back with a fierce bombing campaign that has killed more than 11,000 people, mostly civilians, and cut off supplies of water, electricity, fuel and food to the territory of 2.4 million people, creating chronic shortages.
Aid agencies have repeatedly raised the alarm about the lack of fuel — used to power vital services such as hospitals which rely on generators, and for purifying and pumping drinking water.
“This morning two of our main water distribution contractors ceased working — they simply ran out of fuel — which will deny 200,000 people potable water,” White said.
According to COGAT, the Israeli defense ministry body that handles Palestinian civil affairs, no fuel has entered the Gaza Strip since “before the war”.
Earlier on Monday, the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said all hospitals in the northern Gaza Strip had stopped functioning as a result of the impact of fuel shortages and intense ongoing fighting.