Some Gazans given cash for food, but find few supplies to buy: UN

United Nations, Aug 2 (IANS) Relief workers have handed cash to more than 10,000 hungry families in Gaza, who find little food on the market to spend on, UN humanitarians said.

"Market prices remain highly volatile and out of reach for many," the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said on Friday.

OCHA said that nearly a week after the Israelis allowed the scale-up of aid and the safe passage for relief convoys, the assistance that has entered Gaza remains insufficient. Convoys continue to face obstacles and danger along the routes mapped out by the Israeli authorities, Xinhua news agency reported.

The office said the months-long deprivation of most life-sustaining basics has led to a deepening of the crisis, and large numbers of people reportedly continue to be killed and injured searching for food. More than 100 people were killed in the past two days along food convoy routes or near Israeli militarised distribution hubs.

UN Children's Fund Deputy Executive Director Ted Chaiban, who just returned from Israel and Gaza, described some of the mission to reporters at the UN headquarters in New York.

"We called for more humanitarian aid and commercial traffic to come in, moving closer toward 500 trucks a day, to stabilize the situation and reduce the desperation of the population ... We need to flood the strip with supplies using all channels and all gates," he said.

OCHA said fuel remains in short supply, although limited quantities have been allowed to enter Gaza in recent days.

"The United Nations and our partners need hundreds of thousands of liters of fuel every day to power critical facilities, including health, water and sanitation, as well as emergency telecommunication services," the office said.

OCHA said that while fewer humanitarian movements are denied outright, approved missions still take hours to complete because they are being forced to halt at various points along the approved routes.

--IANS

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