Engineer Jamal Al-Khudari, Chairman of the People´s Committee to Confront the Siege, confirmed the deterioration of the humanitarian, economic and health situation in the Gaza Strip due to the continuous Israeli siege for the fourteenth year in a row, and stressed that the Corona pandemic increased the state of deterioration.
Al-Khudari indicated in a press statement issued on Friday that the blockade and Corona threaten the food security of about 80% of the families in the Gaza Strip.
Al-Khudari mentioned that poverty and unemployment rates have risen to extremely dangerous levels, as more than 80% live below the poverty line, and the unemployment rate among the youth has risen to 70%, which is a high percentage considering that the Palestinian society is a young society.
He indicated that the economic collapse is represented by a decline in the production rate in factories to 20%, pointing to the deterioration of the economic situation of day laborers and owners of shops and workshops, who were greatly affected by measures to confront Corona.
He pointed to the difficult and catastrophic health situation as a result of the blockade, which it is feared will collapse due to the outbreak of the Corona epidemic, and the need for more medical equipment, devices and supplies to provide medical care to the injured.
Al-Khoudary reiterated that what more than two million citizens of Gaza are living through is "a collective punishment imposed by the occupation and constitutes a war crime."
He said, "The current stage cannot bear more waiting, given the disastrous reality that Gaza is experiencing, and practical steps are required that lead to lifting the siege and saving the humanitarian situation."
Al-Khudari called for lifting the Israeli blockade on Gaza and supplying it with all its urgent humanitarian and health needs in order to be able to recover healthily and economically, and to ensure food security for Palestinian families whose food security is threatened.
He said, "Major countries were considered to be among the economically and healthiest countries that were afflicted by what happened due to the Corona pandemic, so how about besieged Gaza, which already suffers from a great shortage of medicines and medical equipment," stressing that the meeting of the siege pandemic and the Corona pandemic on Gaza is a dangerous matter, which requires intervention Urgently from the international community to save the dangerous humanitarian conditions, and not only monitor the situation, follow up on the deteriorating conditions or issue reports.