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Gaza: Stuck!

There can be no doubting that the recent Gaza War wreaked havoc on the infrastructure of Gaza - apart from the lives lost and injuries sustained by Gazans. And we won't even start talking about the traumatised people, children in particular.

After the War substantial aid was promised to the Gazans to build new homes and restore infrastructure such as hospitals and schools.

4 months later - and what has happened? Absolutely nothing, as an UN official has pointed out.

CommonDreams [reproducing a Reuters report] reports in "Gaza Still Waiting for Pledged Aid: UN Official":

"None of a $4.5 billion package of reconstruction aid recently pledged for the Gaza Strip has got through because of border restrictions, a top U.N. official said on Thursday.

But John Ging, head of the U.N. Relief and Works Agency in Gaza, said Gaza had still not benefited from any of the aid because of restrictions on the flow of goods into the territory.

"There is no prospect of recovery or reconstruction until we can get access for construction materials," Ging said.

"Billions of dollars were pledged for recovery and reconstruction and yet none of that can actually connect with those whose lives were destroyed," he told a news briefing during a trip to European Union headquarters in Brussels.

Israel has said it had opened Gaza's border to larger amounts of food and medicine since the December-January offensive against Hamas militants who control the Palestinian enclave and were firing rockets against Israeli towns.

The war destroyed some 5,000 homes and, according to figures from a Palestinian rights group, killed over 1,400 people."

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