Days of Palestine – Gaza
MP Jamal Al-Khudari, head of the Popular Committee Against the Blockade, confirmed that the direct and indirect losses of the Gaza Strip due to the continuation of the Israeli blockade amounted to about one and a half billion dollars during the year 2020.
Al-Khudari stressed in a statement issued on Thursday that the year 2020 was the most dangerous ever and that the continuation of the blockade for the fourteenth year in a row brought the humanitarian, health, and economic situation into a difficult catastrophic situation, while the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic increased the deterioration of the already exhausted humanitarian situation.
He indicated that the blockade and coronavirus threaten the food security of about 70% of families in Gaza, while more than 85% live below the poverty line, and unemployment rates have risen to 60%, indicating that more than 350,000 workers are unemployed.
He pointed to the acute shortage of medical consumables, medicines, and respirators, which represents severe stress on the lives of the two million Palestinians living in Gaza.
He pointed out that 80% of the factories have been closed since the beginning of the blockade, while the rate of production in the factories that work has decreased to 20%, due to the occupation and the blockade, the entry of raw materials necessary for industry and the restriction of import and export movement, and the deterioration of the economic situation of day laborers and shopkeepers And workshops.
He indicated that dozens of shops, institutions, and companies closed their doors during the year 2020 due to their inability to work in light of the economic stalemate and the decline in income levels and the production process, a very large decline.
Al-Khudari emphasized that all this constituted a blow to the Palestinian economy and a blow to Palestinian families.
Al-Khudari called on the free world to move quickly and urgently in a "moral, humanitarian and legal" movement to save Gaza and stand by it, indicating that the world moves to help any country whose health system has collapsed due to the coronavirus epidemic while turning its eyes blind to what is happening in Gaza and what things have reached.
He pointed out that what awaits Gaza in the new year 2021 in light of the current situation, and if the humanitarian, health and economic conditions continue in this way with the continuation of the blockade, it cannot be imagined.
"The world should not wait for what the people of Gaza are waiting for, but rather take urgent and strong action to save what can be saved," he said.
Al-Khudari stressed the need to lift the siege on Gaza because that is the main gateway to overcoming the current serious crises, and this requires an international effort and a unified Palestinian plan capable of overcoming this dangerous situation that the humanitarian situation has reached.
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