Photos from the El-Zohar slums of Khan Younis in the Gaza Strip. Photographed by Khalil Hamra, November 2020.
Israel says the restrictions are needed to keep Hamas from building up its military capabilities. The bitter enemies have fought three wars and numerous skirmishes over the years. But critics say the blockade has amounted to collective punishment, hurting the living conditions of Gaza’s 2 million inhabitants while failing to oust Hamas or moderate its behavior. Gaza has almost no clean drinking water, it suffers from frequent power outages and people cannot freely travel abroad. “The result has been the near-collapse of Gaza’s regional economy and its isolation from the Palestinian economy and the rest of the world,” the U.N. agency said in a statement.The report analyzed both the effects of the closure, which has greatly limited Gaza’s ability to export goods, as well as the effects of the three wars, which took place in 2008-2009, 2012 and 2014. These economic losses helped propel unemployment in Gaza from 35% in 2006 to 52% in 2018, one of the highest rates in the world, UNCTAD said. It said the poverty rate jumped from 39% in 2007 to 55% in 2017. Based on Gaza’s economic trends before the closure, the report said the poverty rate could have been just 15% in 2017 if the wars and blockade had not occurred.
