As the Israeli army continues its raids in the Gaza Strip, tons of waste and untreated garbage coupled with heat and sewage promote the spread of flies, mosquitoes and rodents, making the Palestinian enclave unsanitary.

According to the UN refugee agency ( UNRWA ), sanitary conditions in the Gaza Strip are deteriorating day by day. "Insects and rodents can spread diseases, threatening people's health and well-being," the UN agency said on the social network X.

In the meantime, residents continue to clamber through mountains of debris. And on the ground, UN aid teams are working to help displaced families in shelters and prevent them from overrunning already overcrowded living spaces.

Import soap, shampoo and detergent

The UNRWA alert comes amid severe shortages. Medicines, chlorine for water purification and hygiene products are starting to run out in the Palestinian enclave.

"There is so little aid coming in that we cannot meet basic needs," added Sam Rose, UNRWA's Director of Planning, noting that the agency had had to try to import individual items such as soap because kits containing a range of items such as washing powder were blocked.

The UN Water and Sanitation and Health Clusters on Friday, September 13, called for action on the import of soap, shampoo and detergent, demanding that a minimum of five trucks per day of commercial vendors selling essential hygiene items enter the Gaza Strip, both in the south and the north.

With health facilities stretched thin and living conditions unsanitary, aid agencies fear that shortages of hygiene items will make it harder to protect against communicable diseases. “The lack of hygiene items disproportionately affects children, pregnant women and people with weakened immune systems,” the UN aid agencies said.

Gaza needs at least 550 tons of soap per month

In the Palestinian enclave, soap is either not available in the markets or is sold at unreasonable prices, on average, the equivalent of $10 per 75g piece. Shampoo, detergent (including laundry detergent) and dishwashing liquid are no longer available on the market.

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“Worse still, healthcare facilities are struggling to find the minimum cleaning supplies to protect patients, staff and caregivers from infections.”

In response to this public health emergency, the Water and Sanitation and Health Clusters have assessed the urgent need for essential hygiene items in the Gaza Strip. This includes 550 tons of soap per month.

They are also demanding 500,000 bottles of shampoo (700 ml) per month (420 pallets, or 14 pallets per day) and 500,000 bottles of dishwashing liquid (675 ml) per month.

UN agencies estimate that the Palestinian enclave urgently needs 500,000 bottles of detergent or washing powder (1 kg) per month, as well as 100,000 bottles of cleaning detergent (1 litre) per month (410 pallets, or 14 pallets per day).

Attacks on human rights defenders

Meanwhile, the Israeli Defense Forces continue to starve and intentionally kill civilians, while human rights defenders face enormous difficulties in carrying out their peaceful work, a UN independent expert said on Monday.

The oldest human rights organization in Gaza, the Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR), has seen staff members killed and its offices irreparably damaged by airstrikes and ground attacks by the Israeli Defense Forces in recent months, according to the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders.

PCHR's headquarters in Gaza City and branches in Jabalya, Khan Younis and Rafah have all been severely damaged by air raids and ground attacks, forcing staff to relocate and rent office space and logistical support at skyrocketing prices, while some international funding has been suspended.

“There is literally nowhere left where human rights defenders and civil society actors can continue to document the litany of human rights violations that Israel subjects the people of the Gaza Strip to,” Mary Lawlor said in a statement.

Online smear campaign and surveillance

Two PCHR lawyers were killed in February 2024. Nour Abu al-Nour died along with her two-year-old daughter, her parents and her four siblings in an airstrike on her home in Rafah on 20 February 2024. Two days later, Dana Yaghi and 37 members of her family were wiped out in an Israeli airstrike on a home they had moved to for safety in Deir el-Balah, 14 km south of Gaza City.

At the same time, the Palestinian NGO is also the subject of a "vitriolic smear campaign" online by the Israeli group "NGO Monitor", which has "falsely accused PCHR of being linked to terrorists".

Additionally, recent media reports have highlighted Israel's surveillance of PCHR and other Palestinian human rights organizations, including Al-Haq and Addameer in the occupied West Bank, for most of the past decade in connection with their submissions to the International Criminal Court on Israeli human rights violations.