MOST of the population of Gaza do not have access to water, sanitation and hygiene, a United Nations agency reported today.

The UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reports that more than 1.3 million Palestinians in Gaza have access to less than 1.6 gallons of water per person per day for drinking and cooking.

According to humanitarian standards, the minimum amount of water needed in an emergency is four gallons per day for drinking, washing and cooking.

Another 700,000 people in Gaza have access to less than 2.4 gallons of water per person per day since the devastation caused by Israeli forces since their deadly retaliation to the October 7 2023 attack by Hamas and its allies, during which around 1,200 people were killed and more than 240 were taken hostage.

More than 73,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces during its retaliation. 

The OCHA said: “People face overcrowding at water collection points and lack enough containers to transport water back to their homes, a task that is often left to children.” 

Around three-quarters of the people of Gaza rely on water trucks, with humanitarian partners supplying more than 2,500 collection points daily and more than 100 displacement sites across Gaza last month.

The OCHA added that only half of all households in Gaza have access to basic sanitation or private facilities, while more than 900,000 people report being exposed to rubbish accumulating in residential areas.

Meanwhile, Israeli forces have continued their raids and attacks in the occupied West Bank, blocking many Palestinians from travelling, according to Wafa news agency reports.

Israeli forces raided Far’un, a Palestinian town in the Tulkarem governorate in the north-western occupied West Bank.

Local sources told Wafa that Israeli forces also raided the town of Baqa ash-Sharqiyya. 

No arrests were reported despite several military vehicles entering the town.

Israeli forces also closed several military checkpoints surrounding the city of Ramallah to outgoing traffic, causing severe congestion and long vehicle queues, according to Wafa.

Loai Ridi, an American Palestinian whose brother and teenage nephew are under siege by Israeli settlers in their family home in the village of Qusra in the occupied West Bank, told the Al Jazeera news network that “the Israeli forces did nothing to stop the settlers,” and then prevented anyone from reaching his and his neighbours’ homes, situated on a hillside in Qusra.