Continued Israeli shelling has badly damaged Gaza’s water system.
All of Gaza’s desalination plants, 88 per cent of its water wells, and 70 per cent of all sewage, as well as the main water quality testing laboratories have all been damaged during the conflict, according to a report published by Oxfam last month.
Owing to the destruction of water facilities, the obstruction of aid and the severing of external water supplies, Gazans have around 4.7 litres of water per person per day for all purposes including drinking, cooking and bathing, it found.
This is less than a third of the recommended minimum for emergencies of at least 15 litres per day, according to the United Nations.
Last month, Israel’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (Cogat), the Israeli body responsible for facilitating aid in Gaza, said that it had established a team to address sanitation issues.
“The team is also exploring additional measures to improve sanitation in Gaza, including repairing wells, upgrading desalination plants, and extending water lines,” it said.
Aid groups have attempted to repair the infrastructure, install septic tanks and distribute clean water and chlorine tablets, but working in the Gaza Strip remains extremely difficult.
“The humanitarian aid we’ve been able to deliver so far, including water bottles, medical supplies, and hygiene kits, has been nowhere near enough to meet the scale of this crisis,” said Alison Griffin, Head of Conflict and Humanitarian Campaigns at Save the Children UK.
