Gaza suffering

"Israel is still enforcing the sanctions it imposed on Gaza after the Palestinian Islamist movement, Hamas, took over the strip in June 2007, violently ousting its secular rival, Fatah. The Israelis still refuse to let in most imports except food and vital medicine. They still bar building material such as concrete, steel and pipes, as well as industrial equipment. They say they fear that Hamas and other militant groups would use them to build bunkers or weapons, such as the home-made rockets they still sometimes fire at nearby Israeli towns. Supplies for repairing the water and sewage system and the electricity networks damaged during the war are also stuck at the border terminals. A good 90% of the people suffer from power cuts; the rest have no electricity at all. While 32,000 people in a population of 1.5m have no running water, 100,000 or so get water once in every two or three days. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), which looks after Palestinian refugees across the Middle East, says that the rate of infectious diseases, including diarrhoea and viral hepatitis, which result from bad water and sanitation, has risen. Commercial petrol and diesel fuel have not been let into Gaza since November, but the tunnels under the Egyptian border, which were a main target of Israel’s bombs, were rapidly repaired; smuggling is flourishing again. The Palestinian association for petrol-station owners says that 100,000 litres of diesel and 70,000 of petrol enter Gaza every day via the tunnels. The canned broad beans which Mr Khader’s wife heats on a kerosene stove come from Egypt too. “Beans, beans,” sighs her husband. “How many beans can you eat?” It has been months since the family ate meat. The pitta bread they are given by an Islamic charity is their staple. Several of their girls are anaemic. “The doctor told me to give them better food,” says Mrs Khader, wiping tears off her face. “But what can I do? I cry every day.”""