What 'humanitarian crisis'?
According to the UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), there is no shortage of most basic commodities in the Gaza Strip and anything can be brought in through the tunnels, although most Gazans do not have enough money to purchase these goods. The great catastrophe is not starvation, but the fact that 80% of the population are charity cases. In OCHA's eyes, Gaza is not Somalia, but there is a crisis of human dignity there.
In fact, 'international law' does not require Israel to provide Gazans with food, clothing, electricity and water.
Avraham Bell, a member of the law faculty of Bar-Ilan University, wrote two years ago that Israel is under no obligation to provide humanitarian aid to Gaza.
“International law does not require Israel to supply Gaza with fuel or electricity or, indeed with any other materials, goods or services,” he wrote in an article published by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs. “Article 23 of the Fourth Geneva Convention permits states like Israel to cut off fuel supplies and electricity to territories like Gaza. It only requires Israel to permit passage of food, clothing and medicines intended for children under fifteen, expectant mothers and maternity cases.”
In fact, aside from certain amounts of electricity, Israel does not directly supply humanitarian goods itself but allows UN trucks carrying them to cross its border into Gaza.
Even when it comes to food, OCHA maintained in a study published in August 2009 that Gazans are suffering from what it calls “food insecurity.” According to the organization, 1.1 million of Gaza’s 1.5 million population is food insecure, up from just over half in 2008.
“The main causes of food insecurity are the increase in poverty, the destruction of agricultural assets, and the inflation in prices of key food items,” it wrote.
“There has been a gradual shift in the diet of Gazans from the high-cost and protein-rich foods, such as fruit, vegetables and animal products, to low-cost and high-carbohydrate foods such as cereals, sugar and oil, which can lead to micro-nutrient deficiencies, particularly among children and pregnant women.”
Read the whole thing. The whole 'humanitarian crisis' is manufactured nonsense.
Israel Matzav: What 'humanitarian crisis'?
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