By Ola Attallah, IOL Correspondent
GAZA CITY — Hend has never hated night fall, but Israel is forcing the Gaza college student to do.
“This is unbearable, I can’t take it any more,” a distressed Hend told IslamOnline.net.
The impoverished Gaza Strip, home to 1.6 million, sinks into total darkness every night over the lack of fuel supplies to feed its sole power plant.
Hend stays awake every night struggling to see through the dark to study for her upcoming mid-term exams.
“I study on the light of candles all night. Eventually, my eyes get terribly sore,” she said with her face barley seen though the candlelight.
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“I wake up every morning with a killing headache and I go to college almost blinded by the pain.”
It’s not the first time Gaza plunges into darkness under the Israeli blockade.
Even before the November cut off, electricity supply in Gaza ran 30 percent below demand.
Human Rights Watch has slammed Israel’s power cuts to the people of Gaza as a violation of the law of war.
Despite international criticism, Israel remains adamant on maintaining its Gaza closure.
In Khaled Abdu’s house, even candlelight has become a luxury.
“We have sought candles in almost every shop around, the answer is always ‘sorry, sold,’ and so we return empty-handed,” his wife says bitterly.
“My children had to sleep with total darkness surrounding them.”
Israel has been closing the Gaza Strip’s exits to the outside world since Hamas took control of the territory last June.
Paralyzed Life
Gaza officials warn that if the power cuts continued, the situation would turn into a full-blown humanitarian disaster.
“The magnitude of the disaster will engulf all aspects of life,” Saheel Sakik, head of the Gaza Electricity Distribution Company (GEDCO), told IOL.
Many hospitals have partially stopped working due to power and medical shortages.
The Hamas government warned on Sunday, November 23, that patients at al-Shifa hospital and Gaza European Hosbital, the largest medical facilities in the strip, could die as the two hospital face closure due to the lack of power.
Life necessities are already vanishing from Gaza markets.
“Our life is paralyzed,” Abu Ra`ed Ragab told IOL.
The Gazan father struggles to get potable water to his family everyday as the cuts of electricity have stopped the pumping of fresh water in his home.
“I breaks my heart to hear my children crying and I can not help them.”
Abdul-Nasser Al Ajrami, head of the Association of Bakeries in the Gaza Strip, affirmed that all bakeries have resorted since Saturday to grinding “secondary wheat” which is used to feed birds and certain animals.
Sitting in her home surrounded with candles, Om Said can’t help feel abandoned by Arabs and Muslims.
“The situation is getting worse by the minute.”
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