Since a month ago, Israel is carrying out an offensive in northern Gaza, with continuous attacks.
The UN-linked expert panel Famine Review Committee (FRC) warns that the humanitarian situation throughout Gaza is “extremely serious and worsening rapidly”. In northern Gaza, the situation is the worst, TT reports.
The secretary general of the Norwegian aid organization NRC, Jan Egeland, has just left Gaza. When SVT talks to him, he is in Beirut in southern Lebanon
– Gaza is totally destroyed, there are no other words for it. There is not a building that is not completely or partially destroyed, he says.
“Mass death is at the door”
He is there for the second time since February, and has visited Gaza City, Khan Younis and Deir Al Balah in southern Gaza, among others.
– It is not just starvation, it is mass death that is at the door. The majority of the population will starve to death or be killed if the starvation and bombing are not stopped.
Israel has been accused by the United Nations of preventing supplies of food and water from reaching northern Gaza. The worsening humanitarian situation in the area has led, among others, the United States to demand that Israel allow more emergency aid into Gaza.
Egeland: More help must come in
Israel’s UN ambassador, Danny Danon, said earlier in October according to the BBC that “more than enough emergency aid” has entered Gaza since the war began, but admits there are challenges. Among other things, he accuses the terrorist organization Hamas of intercepting aid broadcasts, selling the content and making money from it, which Hamas has denied.
Jan Egeland points to three things that must be implemented in order for the situation to improve both in Gaza and in Lebanon.
– Number one is a ceasefire. Israel will not become safer by bombing Gaza and Lebanon. Number two is that we must have completely open borders for aid shipments. You cannot continue to starve Gaza.
Finally, he says that a larger peace process must take place where Israel’s security is guaranteed from the US and Europe.
– And with clear recognition from its neighboring countries. You have never received that from Hamas and Hezbollah.