Gaza aid stuck in Egypt as Israel's ethnic cleansing campaign sees no end

News Desk - The Cradle 

Experts warn that 2.2 million Palestinians face starvation and disease as food and drinking water have all but run out inside the world's largest open-air prison

No humanitarian aid deliveries have been allowed into the besieged Gaza Strip as of 17 October, as at least 4,500 trucks remain stuck on the Egyptian side of the Rafah border crossing.

Israel has so far blocked any aid deliveries into the coastal enclave as it continues to drop hundreds of bombs onto the civilian population for the 10th straight day.

“It is a few minutes past 11 am here in Gaza, and we can still hear explosions, as well as the sounds of fighter jets above us … Food is running out; we have visited warehouses, and they are all empty,” writes Al Jazeera reporter Safwan Kahlout from Gaza, adding, “The situation is dire, and if humanitarian aid does not enter Gaza, we may see people dying.”

The UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) issued a report on Tuesday saying that the lack of drinking water for Gazans is raising concerns about “dehydration and waterborne diseases,” citing the collapse of “water and sanitation services, including today’s shutdown of Gaza’s last functioning seawater desalination plant.”

“One line of water was opened today for three hours only in the South of the Gaza Strip, feeding limited water to only half of the population of Khan Yunis (nearly 100,000 people). This does not solve the urgent water needs in other parts of Khan Yunis, the Middle Area, and Rafah. Only 14 percent of the population in the Strip benefited from this three-hour opening of the water line,” UNRWA details.

According to UN officials, 600,000 liters of fuel are needed daily in Gaza to operate water and desalinization plants. They also stress that fuel reserves at all hospitals in Gaza will run out within 24 hours.

The lack of aid deliveries for Gaza comes despite a robust diplomatic push from Washington to convince Israel to allow the aid in.

"Today, and at our request, the United States and Israel have agreed to develop a plan that will enable humanitarian aid from donor nations and multinational organizations to reach civilians in Gaza," US State Secretary Anthony Blinken said on Monday from Israel.

However, Israeli officials have played down the dire humanitarian crisis in Gaza, with Mark Regev, a senior adviser to the Israeli prime minister, telling Times Radio in the UK that opening Rafah crossing “Is just a matter of crossing the Ts and dotting the Is … We are working on this; if it was easy, it would have been done already.”

“There is no humanitarian crisis in Gaza,” the Israeli ambassador to the UK, Tzipi Hotovely, said during a TV interview on Monday, adding, “Would you expect your government to think about those Nazis committing those crimes?” about the population of Gaza, half of whom are children.