People are dying in Gaza, Help us!

Death and Darkness in Gaza

Information Clearing House, January 20, 2008

By Maan

Five patients dead due to electricity cutoffs in Gaza hospitals: Hamas claimed Sunday night that five patients died because of the cutoff of electricity in Gaza hospitals resulting from the Israeli blockade.

Hamas Leader Pleads Help For Gaza From Arab Nations : : The Hamas leadership pleaded with Arab leaders and the rival Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, on Sunday, asking them to forget their differences and help the beleaguered Gazans.

20/01/08 "ICH" -- -- A humanitarian crisis is underway as the Gaza Strip's only power plant began to shut down on Sunday, and the tiny coastal territory entered its third full day without shipments of vital food and fuel supplies due to Israel's punitive sanctions.

The Gaza Strip's power plant has completely shut down on Sunday because it no longer has the fuel needed to keep running. One of the plant's two electricity-generating turbines had already shut down by noon.

This will drastically reduce output to 25 or 30 megawatts, down from the 65 megawatts the plant produces under normal conditions. By Sunday evening the plant will shut down completely, leaving large swaths of the Gaza Strip in darkness.

Omar Kittaneh, the head of the Palestine Energy Authority in Ramallah, confirmed that by tonight, the one remaining operating turbine will be powered down, and the Gaza power plant will no longer be generating any electricity at all.

"We have asked the Israeli government to reverse its decision and to supply fuel to operate the power plant", Dr. Kittaneh said. "We have talked to the Israeli humanitarian coordination in their Ministry of Energy [National Infrastructure]. We say this is totally Israel's responsibility, and that reducing the fuel supplies until the plant had to shut down will affect not only the electrical system but the water supply, and the entire infrastructure in Gaza – everything."

After months of increasingly harsh sanctions, Israel imposed a total closure on the Strip's border crossings, even preventing the delivery of humanitarian aid. The Israeli government says the closure is punishment for an ongoing barrage of Palestinian homemade projectiles fired from the Gaza Strip.

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