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Gaza: 25,000 inhabited homes need urgent reconstruction

September 23, 2019 at 1:02 pm

A Palestinian boy walks among the rubble of his home after it was destroyed by Israeli air strikes in Gaza on 14 November 2018 [Mustafa Hassona/Anadolu Agency]

Some 25,000 inhabited flats in the Gaza Strip are in need of urgent reconstruction while a further 60,000 need renovation works to meet the minimum standards for residential buildings, the Ministry of Housing said yesterday.

The Shehab News Agency reported Deputy Housing Minister Naji Sarhan saying 120,000 homes were needed in the besieged Gaza Strip, with 14,000 being build every year to meet the demands of a growing population.

The ministry, he added, will contact Sarhan also said that the ministry had launched the largest scanning project related to the needs of the poor families, noting that the ministry has already received 41,000 applications for residential apartments.

He noted that his ministry is to contact the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) to obtain $10 million for the renovation projects.

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In summer 2014 Israel launched a devastating war against the Strip. The war had killed over 2,200 Palestinians, the vast majority amongst them civilians, and 71 Israelis, the majority of them soldiers.

The war left Gaza in ruins, as over 17,000 homes were completely destroyed, and thousands of other structures, including hospitals, schools, and factories destroyed or severely damaged.

The war fully shattered whatever semblance of economy the Strip had had. Today, 80 percent of all Palestinians in Gaza live below the poverty line, the majority of whom are dependent on humanitarian aid.