SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
International aid agencies are calling Gaza a humanitarian catastrophe. The United Nations World Food Program says 1 in 3 people in Gaza cannot eat for days at a time. The Gaza Ministry of Health says that dozens of people have died of hunger in recent days. More than a hundred international humanitarian groups, including Amnesty International and Doctors Without Borders, have signed a statement calling for Israel to end its blockade of Gaza and says they are, quote, "witnessing their own colleagues and partners waste away before their eyes." Shaina Low is communications adviser for the Norwegian Refugee Council, which also signed the statement, and she joins us now from Amman. Thank you so much for being with us.
SHAINA LOW: Thank you, Scott.
SIMON: What do your colleagues on the ground in Gaza tell you about conditions there?
LOW: Conditions there are simply indescribable. Our colleagues themselves are going hungry. They are starving. They are, frankly, at a loss for words after 21 months of pleading with the world to do something and now facing starvation themselves and seeing the widespread impacts across Gaza. It is simply shocking to see them waste away. It is shocking what they are telling us they are seeing on the ground.
SIMON: Yesterday, Israel said it will allow airdrops of humanitarian aid. Do you think that'll help?
LOW: The airdrops are wholly insufficient. Of course, any amount of food is better than no amount of food. But we know from past experience last year, when there were airdrops, that they - that first of all, we had people who were dying going and seeking out that aid, where parachutes failed and aid crushed aid seekers, or people drowned in the Mediterranean trying to seek aid that had blown into the sea. We know the way to get aid into Gaza and how to stave off this crisis, how to start treating people with malnutrition. And that's opening all of the crossings, which Israel has for the most part closed throughout these last 21 months, and especially since March 2 of this year.
There are thousands and thousands of tons of aid waiting to enter. We just need that aid to be able to actually go through those crossings and to be able to access it and for the - for Israel to facilitate our movement across Gaza, our access throughout Gaza, in order to be able to deliver.
SIMON: Well, in line with that, Israel has said that the U.N. has failed to distribute what they describe as 950 truckloads of aid that's parked in a fenced-off area near the Kerem Shalom crossing point in the Gaza Strip. Do you know anything about this?
LOW: It's not just about getting the aid to the crossings and to the Gaza side of the crossings. As humanitarians, we need access to those crossings from the Gaza side. We need to be able to safely bring our trucks and our personnel there to pick up the aid, and we need access to be able to deliver that aid. What we've seen, between the ongoing bombardments, Israeli access denials and insecurity on the road due to the lack of law and order caused by Israel's targeting of civilian police officers - it makes conditions incredibly dangerous for aid agencies, including the U.N., to be able to access that aid and safely distribute.
SIMON: There are no talks for a ceasefire going on now, at least officially. What do you believe would provide immediate emergency aid to people in Gaza?
LOW: Well, first and foremost, we do need a ceasefire, and we need a ceasefire immediately. Too many innocent civilians are dying each day, being targeted as they go and seek aid, being targeted in the tents that they've been forced to seek shelter in. And then, of course, we need the scaling up of aid. As I mentioned, there are thousands and thousands of truckloads of aid waiting to enter - not just food but, in addition, medical supplies, fuel to power the bakeries, the water desalination plants, hospitals. We need shelter materials for the hundreds of thousands of people who have been newly displaced since the ceasefire collapsed back in March. Those are the things that would provide immediate relief to the people in Gaza. Unfortunately, the airdrops that have been announced will fail to make a dent in the tremendous sea of needs that we are facing.
SIMON: You worried about your own staff with the Norwegian Refugee Council?
LOW: Of course. Just last week, some of our facilities were placed under displacement orders by the Israeli military. We've had to relocate our staff. Most of our staff have been relocated - have been displaced multiple times over the last 21 months. They themselves are starving. They are searching for food themselves. They are exhausted. And really, they still are committed to delivering as best as they can. We continue to provide clean drinking water to thousands of people across Gaza, but have had to reduce the number of sites due to ongoing displacement orders and due to ongoing instability and danger. It's - the situation that our staff is facing is no different than what ordinary Palestinians in Gaza are facing - insecurity, hunger and desperation.
SIMON: Shaina Low of the Norwegian Refugee Council, speaking to us from Amman, Jordan. Thank you very much for being with us.
LOW: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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