OCHA: Hostilities drive further death, displacement in Gaza

18 July 2025

OCHA warns that the continued onslaught and mass deprivation of people in the Gaza Strip are being normalized. Every day brings more preventable deaths, displacement and desperation.

Just today, the Israeli authorities issued yet another displacement order, this time for parts of North Gaza. OCHA also continues to receive deeply troubling reports of malnourished children and adults being admitted to hospitals with little resources available to treat them properly.

OCHA warns that the energy crisis in Gaza continues to deepen, despite the resumption of limited fuel imports. This is because the small quantities entering – while critical to continue – remain at lower levels than what was previously able to be extracted from dwindling internal reserves, which are now fully depleted.

The depletion of fuel has forced solid waste collection to pause over the past couple of days, and additional water wells have also had to shut down, particularly in Deir al Balah. While specific health services – including dialysis – have reduced or shut down, others could go on for a few more days before they, too, will have to go dark. With every day that passes, people have less clean water and healthcare and more sewage flooding ground floors.

Since the limited entry of fuel supplies resumed on 9 July, the UN has managed to send just over 600,000 litres of diesel to Kerem Shalom. Yesterday, for the first time, the UN was also able to send 35,000 litres of much-needed benzene. These volumes are limited because Israeli authorities have allowed only 14 trucks over the past week. On average, this is 55,000 litres per day, including the weekends, when the crossing is closed.

To sustain life-saving operations, hundreds of thousands of litres of fuel are needed every single day. The limited fuel now coming in is being allocated primarily to health, water and telecommunications services, as well as to power vehicles.

Fuel is offloaded into an underground pipeline on the Israeli side of Kerem Shalom, then extracted on the Gaza side by separate Palestinian tankers. This is another chokepoint: The compound is fenced off and heavily militarized. For drivers to access it, Israeli authorities must pause hostilities, give the green light, and allow enough time for extraction and safe return of UN teams through highly dangerous terrain. This creates delays and further undermines the predictability of fuel flows.

Meanwhile, humanitarian movements inside Gaza continue to be restricted. Yesterday, seven out of 13 attempts to coordinate the movement of aid workers and supplies with the Israeli authorities were facilitated, allowing humanitarian teams to retrieve some fuel, collect some water, relocate generators, provide supplies related to hygiene and sanitation, and transfer much-needed medical supplies. However, the six remaining attempts were either denied outright or approved initially but then faced impediments on the ground.