Following this weekend’s demolition of a United Nations World Food Program (WFP) warehouse in Gaza by the Israeli army, the agency issued a strong appeal to the Israeli Government to compensate for the losses incurred and observe humanitarian principles.
WFP lost 537 tons of food—413 tons of wheat flour, 107 tons of rice and 17 tons of vegetable oil—worth $271,000, which was stored in the warehouse in Jaballia. The three-story WFP building was targeted in a military incursion on Saturday night, November 30.
The food, comprised mainly of European donations, was to be distributed by the Palestinian Ministry of Social Affairs to some 41,300 destitute Palestinians affected by the ongoing humanitarian crises in the Gaza Strip, according to the organization’s press release.
According to WFP, Israeli army forces surrounded the area and six tanks were parked in front of the building. After requesting residents to evacuate their homes, soldiers entered the building and conducted a search of the premises with dogs.
Despite the fact that the storage area was well marked as a WFP warehouse, the owner of the building witnessed dynamite sticks being placed in various parts of the building and at approximately midnight, several blasts were heard, followed by a large explosion from a projectile dropped from a helicopter. The building collapsed and everything left in it was destroyed. — (menareport.com)
© 2002 Mena Report (www.menareport.com)
