'Nowhere safe to go' for Gaza's civilians, aid groups warn

Israel has cut off delivery of food, fuel, medicine and aid to Palestinian enclave

Palestinian families leave eastern Gaza after Israeli air strikes. AFP

Live updates: Follow the latest on Israel-Gaza

Leading aid organisations warned on Wednesday that operations in Gaza have been severely hampered by Israel's renewed military assault, worsening the humanitarian crisis and leaving nowhere safe for Palestinian civilians.

Israel halted deliveries of food, fuel, medicine and other aid to Gaza's two million-plus population on March 10, when authorities cut off the electricity supply to the only operational large-scale desalination plant in the enclave.

“No fuel is coming in, so the diesel stock is depleting, and now we understand we only have four more days of flour left to keep the bakeries operational, so by Sunday, there will be no bread production happening in the large parts of Gaza, which is a vital staple food for people here,” Gavin Kelleher, humanitarian access manager for the Norwegian Refugee Council in Gaza, said.

Speaking from Deir Al Balah, Clemence Lagouardat, Oxfam’s head of response in Gaza, said the territory’s water production sector was also at risk of collapse within days.

The resumption of Israeli military operations has displaced 142,000 people in a week, the UN said, adding that about 90 per cent of Gaza's population has been displaced at least once between the start of the war on October 7, 2023 and January of this year.

The war has killed more than 50,180 Palestinians, Gaza health officials say.

On Wednesday, the Israeli military ordered new evictions in parts of Gaza city as it intensified operations against the Palestinian militant group Hamas.

"Palestinians in general have nowhere safe to go, and there's not even a pretence of a safe place in Gaza any more,” said Mr Kelleher. “There's a massive amount of confusion and utter disbelief that this is still being allowed to happen to them."

He said many Palestinians were now unable to flee at all, having used up all their resources after several displacements. "They have exhausted now all of their coping mechanisms for displacement," he said. "They can't afford to hire any support to help move. They can't even afford to rent donkey carts now to cross back into south Gaza.

Dr Feroze Sidhwa, a US critical care surgeon who is volunteering with MedGlobal at the Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis and has worked in Ukraine three times since the Russian invasion began, said the Palestinian people feel forgotten.

“When Russia bombs Children's Hospital in Kyiv, everybody loses their mind and rightly so,” said Dr Sidhwa. “It's not a joke, but what's going on here [in Gaza] is far more severe, and they [Palestinians] see that the world, and especially the West, just doesn't seem to care.”