This Thursday, the United Nations warned that another 1.74 million Palestinians could fall into poverty in the coming months if the war between Israel and Hamas does not end.
The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) said in a report that poverty levels in the Occupied Palestinian Territories continue to rise as the Israeli offensive on the Gaza Strip approaches its seventh month.
According to the UNDP, gross domestic product (GDP) in the Palestinian territories fell by 26.9% (about 6.6 billion euros) compared to data collected in 2023, before the war began.
“Every additional day of this war comes at a huge and growing cost to Gazans and all Palestinians now, in the medium and long term,” UNDP said, as quoted by Spanish agency Europa Press.
UNDP administrator Achim Steiner said the new data “warns that suffering in the Gaza Strip will not end with the end of the war.”
“The unprecedented level of loss of life, destruction of capital and sharp rise in poverty in such a short period of time will lead to a serious development crisis that threatens the future of future generations,” he said.
The war was sparked by an attack on Israeli soil by the Palestinian extremist group Hamas on October 7, 2023, which killed about 1,200 people and captured two hundred hostages, according to Israeli authorities.
Since then, the Israeli offensive on the Gaza Strip has killed nearly 34,600 people and destroyed many infrastructures in the Palestinian enclave, according to a report from the local Hamas-controlled government.
In a paper on the socio-economic impact of the conflict, the UNDP estimates that three more months of fighting would raise the poverty rate among Palestinians to 60.7%, equivalent to 2.25 times the pre-war level.
The increase means an additional 1.86 million people below the poverty line and a 29% decline in GDP, with a total loss of around seven billion euros.
The UNDP fears development will regress to pre-2004 levels, when the Human Development Index (HDI) was first calculated for the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
Direct damage to infrastructure built in the Gaza Strip amounts to approximately $18.5 billion (€17.2 billion), equivalent to 97% of the territory’s total GDP in 2022.
The UNDP estimates that the unemployment rate in the region will increase by 0.5 percentage points for each additional month of war, reaching 46.1%.
Forecasts show poverty could increase by 127.3% in the next three months compared to pre-war levels.
Author: Lusa
Source: CM Jornal
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