Water Access in North Gaza, Rafah Down to 7 Percent of Pre-Genocide Levels

Israel’s genocide in Gaza has destroyed over 1,000 miles of water and sanitation infrastructure in Gaza and reduced the region’s water capacity to a small fraction of what it was prior to the genocide, officials have assessed, underscoring the dire need for further aid and an end to Israel’s blockade.

According to a report by Oxfam, Israel has wrecked at least 1,040 miles of Gaza’s water and sanitation network, with over 80 percent of infrastructure partially or totally destroyed. This includes the destruction of the vast majority of sewage pumps, desalination plants and municipal wells, the group found.

Northern Gaza and Rafah, where Israel’s assault was the most intense, have seen the worst impacts. According to Oxfam, water access in these areas has been slashed to a mere 7 percent of levels from before the genocide. In those areas, Palestinians only have access to roughly 1.5 gallons of water per day per person, “barely enough for one toilet flush,” the group said.

“Now that the bombs have stopped, we have only just begun to grasp the sheer scale of destruction to Gaza’s water and sanitation infrastructure. Most vital water and sanitation networks have been entirely lost or paralyzed, creating catastrophic hygiene and health conditions,” said Oxfam’s humanitarian coordinator for the Strip, Clémence Lagouardat.

Lagouardat said that humanitarian staff in the region say children regularly approach them to ask for water. “It is heartbreaking to hear about children having to walk for miles for a single jerrycan of water,” Lagouardat said.

That water levels have decreased so dramatically is alarming considering that water access in Gaza was already extremely limited before October 2023. As part of its apartheid rule over Palestinians, Israel had already been accused of weaponizing water access in years prior, with over 95 percent of water sources for the Strip deemed unfit for human consumption due to pollution and contamination.

The situation was so dire that, in 2012, the UN warned that Gaza would be rendered “unliveable” by 2020 as a result of Israel’s blockade, suppression of Gaza’s economic growth, and damages caused by “Operation Cast Lead,” in which Israel killed at least 1,400 Palestinians over the course of 22 days in Gaza in 2008 and 2009.

By 2018, Gaza had already been rendered uninhabitable by Israel’s occupation, the then-Special Rapporteur for Palestine Michael Lynk said at the time.

Now, these issues have been worsened many times over by damage caused by Israel’s genocide and near-total blockade of aid.

“The lack of safe water, combined with untreated sewage overflowing in the streets has triggered an explosion of waterborne and infectious diseases,” Oxfam found. “Infectious diseases including acute watery diarrhoea and respiratory infections — now the leading causes of death — are also surging, with 46,000 cases, mostly children, being reported each week.”

Though Israel is allowing in more aid as part of the ceasefire agreement, it is still blocking the entry of equipment crucial to rebuilding, like heavy machinery and pipes, barring Palestinians from taking steps to begin to reverse the destruction, Oxfam noted.

“Despite the increase in aid since the ceasefire, Israel continues to severely impair critical items needed to begin repairing the massive structural damage from its airstrikes,” Lagouardat said. “This includes desperately needed pipes for repairing water and sanitation networks, equipment like generators to operate wells.”