2 electricity lines feeding southern Gaza damaged

Two power lines supplying the southern Gaza Strip were damaged this morning, according to the head of the public relations department of Gaza’s power company.

Muhammad Thabet told Ma’an that an Egyptian power line feeding parts of Rafah city was damaged in addition to the Israeli line supplying Rafah and Khan Younis.

Last week, several Egyptian power lines and a power generator in the southern Gaza Strip were also damaged, causing further strain on the besieged Palestinian enclave’s tenuous electricity supply.

Gaza’s power authority said at the time that increasing the power supply to Gaza was vital to ensure the proper functioning of basic services, particularly for foreign-funded projects.

The authority notably mentioned a World Bank-funded project to repair the sewage system in northern Gaza which has been on hold for two years, a German-funded project to repair the central Gaza sewage station, and a UNICEF water desalination project, which have all been delayed due to insufficient electricity access.

It added that Gaza’s electricity needs have increased over the past ten years due to heavy Israeli taxation on fuel needed for the power plant and Israeli limitations on the amount of fuel allowed into the Gaza Strip.

Even at full capacity, Egyptian and Israeli electricity grids, together with Gaza’s sole power plant, fail to cover the Gaza Strip’s energy needs and only provide energy to Gaza’s inhabitants for eight hours each day.

The Israeli blockade has also impeded the capacity to repair Gaza’s damaged infrastructure in the wake of a devastating Israeli offensive in 2014.

The power plant has not run at full capacity in years, as the enclave has experienced severe electricity shortages over the years, exacerbating already dire living conditions in the small Palestinian territory, leading the UN in 2015 to warn that Gaza could be “uninhabitable” by 2020.