Gaza: Weakened by Israel's forced starvation, Palestinians in besieged Gaza trek across a ruined landscape each day to haul all their drinking and washing water—a painful load that is still far below the levels needed to keep people healthy.
According to TRTworld.com, even as global attention has turned to starvation in Gaza, where, after 22 months of a devastating Israeli war, a global hunger monitor says a famine scenario is unfolding, the water crisis is just as severe, according to aid groups.
Though some water comes from small desalination units run by aid agencies, most is drawn from wells in a brackish aquifer that has been further polluted by sewage and chemicals seeping through the rubble, spreading diarrhea and hepatitis. "How long will we have to stay like this?" asked a resident as he collected water for his extended family of 20 living in tents in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza.
Their struggle for water is replicated across the territory where nearly everyone is living in temporary shelters or tents without proper hygiene facilities. The United Nations states that the minimum emergency level of water consumption is 15 liters per person per day, while the average daily consumption in Gaza has dropped to 3-5 liters, according to Oxfam.
Bushra Khalidi from Oxfam reported a 150 percent increase in water-borne diseases over the past three months in Gaza. Danish Malik from the Norwegian Refugee Council highlighted the tough choices residents face in rationing water for drinking or hygiene.
The task of water collection often falls to children, who have become carriers of plastic containers, as described by Munther Salem of the Gaza Water and Environment Quality Authority. A new water pipeline funded by the United Arab Emirates is expected to serve 600,000 people from a desalination plant in Egypt, but it will take weeks to connect.
UNICEF's James Elder warned of the deadly consequences of long-term deprivation, while Oxfam's Khalidi emphasized the need for a ceasefire and unfettered access for aid agencies to resolve the crisis, or else face preventable deaths in Gaza.