UN says 85% of Gaza Strip under Israeli military orders, militarized zones

The UN said Wednesday that 85% of the Gaza Strip is within Israeli militarized zones, under displacement orders or in areas where the two overlap, Anadolu reports.

The displacement orders are “severely hampering people’s access to essential humanitarian support and the ability of aid workers to reach those in need,” spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said at a news conference.

Saying that Israel’s latest displacement order for two neighborhoods in Khan Younis, which hosts up to 80,000 residents, he noted that UN partners “working on water, sanitation and hygiene also tell us that Al Satar, a key water reservoir, has become inaccessible as a result of the order.”

Al Satar is the main water distribution hub for Khan Younis and a critical supply point for water coming through the Israeli pipeline in the area.

“Any damage to the reservoir could lead to a collapse of the city’s water distribution system, with grave humanitarian consequences,” he said.

Warning that displacement orders also “strain vital services and push people into increasingly smaller swaths” in the enclave, Dujarric said that “since the breakdown of the ceasefire in March and as of yesterday, some 714,000 people have been forcibly displaced once more across Gaza, with nearly 29,000 displaced in just 24 hours between Sunday and Monday.”

He noted “that no shelter assistance has entered Gaza in four months,” and said: “Our shelter partners say that 97% of the sites surveyed reported displaced people sleeping in the open.”