UNRWA calls for lifting blockade on Gaza as humanitarian aid dwindles

GAZA, March 16 (YPA) – The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) said, on Sunday, that basic humanitarian supplies available in the Gaza Strip are dwindling.

UNRWA stressed, via its X platform, that “no humanitarian aid has entered Gaza since the Israeli occupation halted its entry on March 2,” emphasizing the need to “lift the siege” on the Gaza Strip.

Nearly 15 months after the outbreak of war in the Gaza Strip, after Hamas’s unprecedented attack on the Israeli occupation on October 7, 2023, a ceasefire between the Israeli occupation and the Palestinian movement began on January 19, brokered by the United States, Qatar, and Egypt.

The first phase of the agreement lasted six weeks and allowed for the return of 33 prisoners to Israel, including eight dead prisoners, while the Israeli occupation released approximately 1,800 Palestinian detainees from its prisons.

The Israeli occupation also allowed more humanitarian aid into the besieged Gaza Strip, before suspending its entry on March 2.

Israel cut off electricity to the Gaza Strip last Sunday to increase pressure on Hamas, cutting off the only line supplying the desalination plant.