Israel has denied claims by UNRWA that it is blocking humanitarian aid to Gaza and stated that it has allowed up to 4,400 trucks enter Gaza with humanitarian aid in the last two months. If Israel’s figure is actually correct, the number of trucks allowed into Gaza falls significantly short of the minimum number of trucks needed to provide the essential items for the population of Gaza to survive. The United Nations estimate that at least 600 trucks per day are needed.
A standard truck carries a load between 15 and 25 metric tonnes. A person needs a minimum of 400–450 grams of bread per day just to survive. In one truck, you can fit a total of 25 metric tonnes of flour, which would serve up to approximately 1,852 people for 30 days. If you calculate that bread is only 75% flour, a 25% difference would raise the amount to 2500 people per one truck for 30 days.
If each truck contains up 25 metric tonnes of flour, you would need up to 568 trucks to feed a population of 1.5 million for 30 days. This means that for 60 days (the past two months), Palestinians in Gaza needed a minimum of just 1136 trucks of flour to survive.
Not all trucks are of 25 metric tonnes. Not all of the aid will be successfully delivered: some will be taken by Hamas while some will be lost either by accident or crime.
In addition, to flour, trucks need to carry medicine and medical supplies. Fuel is also needed. However, the most challenging delivery is not with flour but with water. Gaza has no clean water supplies that is safe for drinking so all the drinking water in Gaza has to be brought in by trucks. Water is significantly heavy and takes a lot of space.
A person needs to drink up 3 litres of water every day in a hot climate (Gaza is a hot climate). One truck can carry up to 25 metric tonnes (or not more than 25,000 litres + packaging weight) of bottled water wrapped on wooden pallets. A truck carrying 25,000 litres of water can provide drinking water for approximately 333 people for 30 days, based on a 2.5-litre daily survival standard. Therefore, you would need 4,500 trucks, each carrying 25,000 litres of water, to provide drinking water only for 1.5 million people for 30 days at 2.5 litres/day per person.
By Israel’s own admission, the numbers of trucks permitted into Gaza fall way below the minimum amount of trucks that are needed to provide the essential items for survival.
Newsroom
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