UNRWA suspends food distribution in Rafah due to Israeli military operation

May 22 (UPI) – The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees said it had suspended food distribution in the southern Gaza city of Rafah due to ongoing Israeli military operations and lack of supplies.

Its situation report on Wednesday said Israel’s ongoing military operation in eastern Rafah had made the UNRWA distribution center and the World Food Program camp, both located in the southern city, inaccessible.

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It said the military operation was also affecting the delivery of humanitarian aid to the Palestinian enclave. In the last two days, only 48 trucks entered the Gaza Strip via the Kerem Shalom border crossing with Israel and the Rafah border crossing with northern Egypt.

COGAT, the Israeli agency for the Palestinian territories, said in a statement that 298 trucks carrying humanitarian aid entered the Gaza Strip on Wednesday via Kerem and the Erez crossing in the north of the Gaza Strip.

“We have many people on the ground ready to provide assistance and services, but without cross-border access to relief supplies and without access to our distribution centers, we are simply not in a position to distribute food,” UNRWA spokeswoman Louise Wateridge said on Wednesday.

The WFP said it would continue distributing food until it runs out.

“Thousands of families in #Rafah still need help,” X said. “With little help coming from the southern border crossings and our camp remaining inaccessible, the remaining food supplies are only enough for 50,000 hot meals a day.”

“We need safe and permanent access.”

Humanitarian aid has been a constant need for Palestinians in Gaza in light of the now seven-month-long war between the Iran-backed Hamas and Israel.

The war internally displaced an estimated 1.7 million of the enclave’s more than two million residents, according to the U.N. human rights office.

It is estimated that about half of the population had sought shelter in Rafah by May 6, when Israeli forces began their controversial military operation in the city.

On Wednesday, UNRWA estimated that nearly 815,000 people had fled the city since the campaign began.

“Most UNRWA shelters in Rafah have been evacuated and internally displaced people have moved to Khan Younis and Deir Al Balah,” the update said on Wednesday.