clear

Creating new perspectives since 2009

Gaza returns to 8 hours’ electricity per day, up from 4

October 29, 2018 at 1:06 pm

A Palestinian women is seen using candles in her kitchen due to electricity shortage on 8 July 2015 [Ashraf Amra/Apaimages]

The Palestinian Electricity Company in the besieged Gaza Strip announced on Sunday that it has returned to an eight-hour per day electricity plan, after two years of only four hours’ electricity per day.

In a statement the Electricity Company said: “We were told by the Power and Natural Resources Authority that the third generator of the electricity plant is to be operated on Sunday, so we will start operating electricity eight hours on and eight hours off”.

For the past two years, Palestinians living in the besieged enclave have had electricity for only four hours per day. The Electricity Company was also required to follow a very complex operational plan to guarantee even this small distribution.

In a report issued about the repercussions of the electricity shortage in the Strip, Al-Mezan Centre for Human Rights said that 32 Gaza residents – including 25 children and a woman – died and 36 others – including 20 children and six women – were wounded between 2010 and 2018 in fires caused by using candles and household generators as an alternative to electricity.

The Gaza Strip has been under a strict Israeli-Egyptian, internationally-backed siege since mid-2007. The sole electricity plant in Gaza has been targeted several times by Israeli occupation jets since 2006.

READ: 32 Palestinians died from electricity cuts in Gaza since 2010