Communications with Gaza cut once again

Palestinian Territories – AFP

Communications with Gaza were severed once again, with network provider Paltel saying it was because “all energy sources sustaining the network have been depleted, and fuel was not allowed in”.

The United Nations warned the outage would compound the misery of civilians, complicating efforts to distribute desperately needed aid and possibly triggering looting of its supplies.

“When you have a blackout and you cannot communicate with anyone anymore… that triggers and fuels even more the anxiety and the panic,” said Philippe Lazzarini, head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA).

The UN agency said no aid trucks entered Gaza from Egypt for a second consecutive day and that it would be unable to manage or coordinate more convoys due to the lack of communications.

The army said it struck numerous “terror targets” in Gaza overnight Thursday-Friday, locating rockets and unmanned aerial vehicles at a post of the Islamic Jihad in the north of the territory.

It said troops killed Hamas members at a school where they found a “large number of weapons”.

The military also said troops had recovered the remains of kidnapped woman soldier Noa Marciano, 19, “from a structure adjacent to Al-Shifa hospital”.

It had confirmed her death this week, without giving the cause. Hamas said she had been killed in Israeli bombing.

On Thursday the army said soldiers near Al-Shifa found the body of another hostage. Yehudit Weiss, 65, had been kidnapped from the border kibbutz community of Beeri.

– ‘Pleading for a sip’ –

The Israeli government has come under increasing pressure to back up its allegations that Hamas is using hospitals as command centres.

The United States has stood behind its ally, however, with President Joe Biden this week saying he had asked Israel to be “incredibly careful” in its military moves around Gaza hospitals.

Palestinian health officials on Thursday said the Al-Ahli hospital had come under attack from the Israeli army. The Palestinian Red Crescent reported that medical staff were unable to reach casualties in the courtyard because of Israeli army’s explosions and gunfire.

More than half of Gaza’s hospitals are no longer functional, and Israel’s raid on Al-Shifa left extensive damage to the radiology, burns and dialysis unit, the health ministry said.

AFPTV video showed Palestinians paying their last respects to loved ones on Friday as around a dozen bodies shrouded in white were laid out in front of the Indonesian hospital at Beit Lahia in north Gaza.

On Thursday, Jews and Arabs had come together for the funeral of another casualty of the Beeri attack — peace activist Vivian Silver, who was hailed as an “extraordinary woman”.

On the ground, conditions are rapidly deteriorating for Palestinian civilians, the UN warned.

More than 1.5 million people have been internally displaced, and Israel’s blockade of the territory means “civilians are facing the immediate possibility of starvation,” World Food Programme head Cindy McCain said.

Food and water have become “practically non-existent,” the WHO added.

Lazzarini described children sheltering at a UN school “pleading for a sip of water, or for a loaf of bread”.