JERUSALEM: The United Nations children’s fund said Thursday that Israel had agreed to restore power to a key desalination plant in southern Gaza, which could provide much-needed water to a million displaced people.
“UNICEF confirms an agreement (with Israel) was reached to re-establish the medium voltage feeder power line for the Southern Gaza Desalination Plant,” said Jonathan Crickx, the agency’s spokesman in the Palestinian territories.
Water has become scarce for the Palestinian territory’s 2.4 million residents since war broke out nearly nine months ago.
More than two thirds of Gaza’s sanitation and water facilities have been destroyed or damaged, according to data cited by UN agencies, and only an intermittent supply of bottled water has been allowed in since Israel imposed a punishing siege on the territory.
The plant in Khan Yunis, once resupplied with electricity, should produce enough water to “meet what humanitarian standards define as a minimum intake of 15 liters per day of drinking water per person, for nearly a million displaced people” in southern Gaza, Crickx said.
“This is an important milestone, and we are very much looking forward to seeing it implemented.”
Israel’s coordinator for civilian affairs in the Palestinian territories, known as COGAT, did not immediately respond to an AFP request for comment.
The plant should be able to produce 15,000 cubic meters, or 15 million liters, of water per day at full capacity, according to UNICEF.
After Hamas’s unprecedented attack on October 7, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant announced that he was imposing “a complete siege” on Gaza with “no electricity, no water, no gas.”
Since then, the humanitarian situation has deteriorated considerably, according to aid groups working in Gaza.
Crickx said it was vital to also see “generators and infrastructure to be delivered” to address the damage to the war-battered territory, adding more than 60 percent of its water distribution systems have been damaged since October.
The Gaza war started with Hamas’s attack on southern Israel that resulted in the deaths of 1,195 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures.
Israel’s military campaign in Gaza has killed at least 37,765 people, also mostly civilians, according to data provided by the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory.
UNICEF says deal agreed with Israel to boost Gaza water supply
https://arab.news/cyt59
UNICEF says deal agreed with Israel to boost Gaza water supply
- Water has become scarce for the Palestinian territory’s 2.4 million residents since war broke out
US lawmakers press Israel to probe strike on reporters in Lebanon
- “The IDF has made no effort, none, to seriously investigate this incident,” Welch said
- Collins called for Washington to publicly acknowledge the attack in which an American citizen was injured
WASHINGTON: Several Democratic lawmakers called Thursday for the Israeli and US governments to fully investigate a deadly 2023 attack by the Israeli military on journalists in southern Lebanon.
The October 13, 2023 airstrike killed Reuters videographer Issam Abdallah and wounded six other reporters, including two from AFP — video journalist Dylan Collins and photographer Christina Assi, who lost her leg.
“We expect the Israeli government to conduct an investigation that meets the international standards and to hold accountable those people who did this,” Senator Peter Welch told a news conference, with Collins by his side.
The lawmaker from Collins’s home state of Vermont said he had been pushing for answers for two years, first from the administration of Democratic president Joe Biden and now from the Republican White House of Donald Trump.
The Israeli government has “stonewalled at every single turn,” Welch added.
“With the Israeli government, we have been extremely patient, and we have done everything we reasonably can to obtain answers and accountability,” he said.
“The IDF has made no effort, none, to seriously investigate this incident,” Welch said, referring to the Israeli military, adding that it has told his office its investigation into the incident is closed.
Collins called for Washington to publicly acknowledge the attack in which an American citizen was injured.
“But I’d also like them to put pressure on their greatest ally in the Middle East, the Israeli government, to bring the perpetrators to account,” he said, echoing the lawmakers who called the attack a “war crime.”
“We’re not letting it go,” Vermont congresswoman Becca Balint said. “It doesn’t matter how long they stonewall us.”
AFP conducted an independent investigation which concluded that two Israeli 120mm tank shells were fired from the Jordeikh area in Israel.
The findings were corroborated by other international probes, including investigations conducted by Reuters, the Committee to Protect Journalists, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and Reporters Without Borders.
Unlike Welch’s assertion Thursday that the Israeli probe was over, the IDF told AFP in October that “findings regarding the event have not yet been concluded.”
