Gaza aid still in Egypt
Report, The Electronic Intifada, 3 June 2009
AL-ARISH (IRIN) - The lack of proper warehousing facilities in the northeastern Egyptian cities of al-Arish and Rafah is partly to blame for bottlenecks and inefficiencies in delivering food and other aid to the Gaza Strip, a former senior Egyptian aid official has said.
The only working warehouse in al-Arish had been part-rented to the World Food Programme (WFP) with only some of its space allocated to the Egyptian Red Crescent Society (ERCS), said Ahmed Orabi, head of Egyptian Red Crescent aid operations between June 2008 and April 2009. Not all of the donated food aid arriving in al-Arish could be stored appropriately, and this had led to some wastage, he said.
The coastal city of al-Arish has been a major hub for incoming aid donations during and after the Israeli offensive (27 December 2008 - 18 January 2009). The ERCS works in close partnership with WFP to facilitate the passage of goods into Gaza for UN agencies and non-governmental organizations.
Bekim Mahmuti, head of logistics with WFP's program in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, told IRIN they had encountered no warehousing or access problems in al-Arish. "Our aid was locally purchased in Egypt and stockpiled in our warehouse in al-Arish. It successfully reached Gaza," Mahmuti said from East Jerusalem. He added that WFP had no food aid left in al-Arish by mid-May.
Other reasons for delays and difficulties in getting aid into Gaza are the frequent and unscheduled closures of the Rafah crossing, and the circuitous route that some aid has to take.
Significant quantities of aid -- mainly from Arab and Muslim countries -- have had to be trucked from al-Arish to al-Ouja (50km from Rafah on the Israeli-Egyptian border) and then to Israel's Kerem Shalom crossing into Gaza, according to the January 2009 Regional Humanitarian Update of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).
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