United Nations Radio

A group of UN agencies and NGOs have called for an end to Israel's blockade of the Gaza Strip which has been in force for two years this week, forcing the population to rely on aid.

Gaza reconstruction

In a joint statement, the group said they would like to see free and unhindered access for all humanitarian assistance. Chris Gunness, the spokesman for the UN agency assisting Palestinians, told our Reem Abaza just how important it is that the blockade end.

GUNNESS: We're simply asking for the blockade to be lifted. It's the second anniversary of this. UN leaders such as Mr. Ban Ki-moon himself and other world leaders have described what's happening in Gaza as a collective punishment of the 1.5 million population there. They've called these sanctions punitive and indeed they are, and we're saying the sanctions, the blockade, have got to be lifted. People in Gaza have got to be allowed free humanitarian access: not just access for UN goods and for humanitarian goods, but the crossings have to be opened so that trade can happen, so that exports can come out of Gaza because almost all of the economy has been completely devastated before the fighting recently but also before that because of the blockade.

ABAZA: So you're asking Israel in particular to open the crossings? You're not asking the Egyptian government to do something regarding this too?

GUNNESS: Let's be clear: the Raafa crossing into Egypt is for vehicles and I've been through it, and it is not a crossing point where significant amounts of goods such as industrial-scale building materials can come through. We have a system. We have a system of crossings into Israel. The Karni crossing, for example, is an industrial-scale crossing point where we can get industrial scales of building materials through. These crossings have to be open-and it's the Israeli authorities we have to work with to make sure that they are opened.

ABAZA: Have you got any response from the Israeli government regarding this, or is it too early still?

GUNNESS: It is too early, but we talk to the Israeli authorities every day, and we make them clear of the things that we need. So it's clear from Israelis actions, I think, how it responds. But we hope that Israel will realize that it is not in its own security interest to 1.5 million desperate, angry and desolate people living in destitution on its borders. Such a situation can only really feed the cause of the extremists. The people of Gaza need to be shown a different future. The blockade must be lifted so that they can have a future of stability, prosperity and dignity.

ABAZA: After two years of the blockade, how can the people of Gaza continue to cope? And how can you continue doing your work helping them?

GUNNESS: Well of course the fact that there are tunnels in southern Gaza which allow some goods to come in means that things are not as terrible as they might be. Of course the UN, UNRWA, does not use those tunnels; we try and get things in through the normal, conventional means. You ask how people cope. It is extraordinary how people in Gaza have these amazing coping mechanisms, though the more I go to Gaza, the more I talk to people in Gaza, the more I realize that there is this terrible atmosphere of isolation and desperation. You can see it etched in the faces of the sunken eyes of the children. You can feel it when you walk into a home without any windows, covered in plastic sheeting. You can feel it when you see children trying to bathe at the sea as gallons and gallons of sewage are pumped into the sea. So it is extraordinary how people do have these coping mechanisms in Gaza, and I only can hope that the blockade will be lifted and then that terrible situation can be changed.

ABAZA: From your visits to Gaza, Chris, how would you describe the quality of life over there?

GUNNESS: In a word: disastrous. If you are a mother who can barely feed her children, if you are a father who has been made jobless because of the blockade, if you are a brother or sister who's seen their families been blown up in the recent fighting, if you are father who can't put food on the table, your situation is quite simply desperate.

PRES: Chris Gunness is the spokesman for UNRWA, the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees, speaking from Jerusalem.

duration: 4'15"