UNRWA: Aid trickling into Gaza not even 'a drop in the ocean'

The United Nations agency responsible for Palestine refugees has railed against the "humanitarian tragedy" unfolding in the Gaza Strip, with insufficient aid trickling through for the hundreds of thousands of people the agency is trying to help.  

"This is an utter humanitarian tragedy," UNRWA spokesperson Jonathan Fowler told CGTN. "The amount of food that has got in over recent days – some are describing it as a drop in the ocean, but that would be a massively over-generous description of what has got in. 

"We need to be able to get in 500 to 600 trucks a day to meet the minimum survival needs of the population of the Gaza Strip. That has not been happening. The kind of aid that's been allowed in is basically just flour, a commodity which is not enough. The needs are overwhelming. 

"It's also extremely difficult to distribute anything further north than Khan Younis, which is in the south of the Gaza Strip. The needs are not being met, the aid needs to flow in an unhindered manner, and this needs to happen immediately."

'300 of our staff have been killed'

Fowler said that with aid convoys severely restricted by an Israeli blockade, UNRWA is struggling to help the hundreds of thousands of people in its emergency shelters. 

"We have around 12,000 operational staff working at an immense risk to their lives – tragically, more than 300 of our staff have been killed, all too often along with members of their families," he said. 

"Because of Israeli restrictions on our operations we're not able to fully participate in the current aid operation, however feeble it actually is. Fortunately, we are able to continue certain aspects of our work. 

"We have 19,000 patients going through our clinics, medical points, and being seen by our mobile medical teams – 19,000, every single day. We have something in the order of 35,000 children who are receiving some form of education from us. We also have 100,000 people in our emergency shelters – transformed schools, notably." 

'Reinventing the wheel is not correct'

Israel has offered to help an alternative, U.S.-backed aid distribution organization called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), which was rocked at the weekend by the resignation of its CEO. 

Jake Wood quit the foundation – intended to facilitate private contractors delivering aid to Palestinians via Israel-designated distribution sites – saying it would not be able to fulfill the principles of "humanity, neutrality, impartiality, and independence".

UNRWA's Fowler, while not wanting to discuss Wood's resignation specifically, says the GHF runs contrary to well-established humanitarian protocol. 

"We said from the very beginning, as did other parts of the United Nations, that there is a system which operates around the world which is based on international humanitarian law. Reinventing the wheel is not correct – it's not logical, but it also goes against international humanitarian law to create something which is seen as an alternative – and as it turns out, a pretty dysfunctional alternative. 

"We said that just because you put the name 'humanitarian' into something, it doesn't make it necessarily compatible with international humanitarian law. And we had also said, as has the rest of the UN, that the principles of humanity, neutrality, impartiality and independence are paramount in aid operations."