GAZA, June 14, 2017 (WAFA) - The Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, B‘Tselem, said the Gaza Strip is in the throes of a humanitarian disaster, stressing that it is a crisis with severe, sometimes even fatal, consequences for the two million or so people living there.

In a press statement, B’Tselem stated that without a regular power supply, all aspects of life are harmed; even the water and sewage systems are paralyzed, and untreated sewage flows straight into the Mediterranean.

“This reality is part of an Israeli policy, of the blockade Israel has imposed on Gaza for the past ten years, consigning its residents to living in abject poverty under practically inhuman conditions unparalleled in the modern world,” it said.

The release added that despite this intolerable reality, the Israeli cabinet has decided to accept a cruel plan to further reduce the power supply to Gaza, maintaining that, ‘should the Israeli decision be implemented, the situation in Gaza will deteriorate even further, making the area virtually unlivable.’

The center said the reality in Gaza is not some sort of natural disaster, stressing that it is the result of Israel’s handiwork, achieved by its decade-long implementation of a brutal policy.

“ Israel can, and must, change this reality,” the center concluded.

T.R.