Heavy fighting in Gaza’s Rafah keeps aid crossings closed

Rafah: Heavy fighting between Israeli troops and Palestinian militants on the outskirts of the southern Gaza city of Rafah has left crucial nearby aid crossings inaccessible and caused over 100,000 people to flee north, a United Nations official said Friday.

Israel’s plans for a full-scale invasion of Rafah appear to be on hold for

now, with the United States deeply opposed and stepping up pressure by threatening to withhold arms.

But even the more limited incursion launched earlier this week threatens to worsen Gaza’s humanitarian catastrophe.

Heavy fighting was also underway in northern Gaza, where Hamas appeared to have once again regrouped in an area where Israel has already launched punishing assaults.

Over a million Palestinians have fled to Rafah to escape fighting elsewhere, with many packed into UN-run shelters or squalid tent camps.

The city on the border with Egypt is also a crucial hub for bringing in food, medicine, fuel and other goods.

The UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, known as OCHA, says about 110,000 people have fled Rafah and that food and fuel supplies in the city are critically low.

Georgios Petropoulos, an OCHA official working in Rafah, said the two main crossings near the city remain closed, cutting off supplies and preventing medical evacuations and the movement of humanitarian staff.

“Even if there were assurances to us being able to pass through a corridor, the proximity so close to a military involved in fighting is just not acceptable for something that has to be a humanitarian zone,” he said.

The UN’s World Food Programme will run out of food for distribution in southern Gaza by Saturday unless more aid arrives, Petropoulos said.

He said about 30,000 people were leaving Rafah daily in search of

safety, but that humanitarian workers had no supplies to help them set up camp in a new location.

“We simply have no tents, we have no blankets, no bedding, none of the items that you would expect a population on the move to be able to get from the humanitarian system,” he said.

Israeli troops captured the Gaza side of the Rafah crossing with Egypt on Tuesday, forcing it to shut down.

Rafah was the main point of entry for fuel needed to power vehicles, as well as the generators on which hospitals and water treatment plants rely.