Ironically all those involved in sealing off 1.5 million Palestinians of Gaza Strip into an open-air prison are creating an explosive humanitarian disaster, whatever may be their excuses.

The time bomb continues to click in Gaza, eclipsed by the bimonthly meetings of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, the “international” conference on Middle East peace proposed President George W. Bush for this autumn, the visit last month to the region by Tony Blair, the Quartet’s peace envoy, which coincided with the first visit by an Arab League mission to Israel.

The whole idea seems to be making the life of Palestinians in the West Bank look easier and economically promising in sharp contrast to the situation in the Gaza Strip. There is also an attempt to create the impression that “peace process” has been revived as far as West Bank Palestinians are concerned.

So it is heartening that an international nonviolent resistance project, “The Free Gaza Movement,” is taking action to alert the regional as well as the world public opinion to the plight of the people in the Gaza Strip. Up to 100 Palestinian, Israeli, American, European, African and Asian rabbis, imams, Christian and Buddhist clerics, British MPs, entertainment celebrities, and well known journalists as well as Nakba and Holocaust survivors will sail from Cyprus to Gaza on Aug. 15.

Their declared mission is to open Gaza to unrestricted international access (Palestinian sovereignty), to demonstrate that Israel still occupies Gaza, to express international solidarity with the people of Gaza and the rest of Palestine and to demonstrate the potential of nonviolent resistance methods. More than 35 organizers from 13 countries have consulted Greenpeace for logistical support to sail safe through highly risky Israeli security impediments and restrictions.

Several prominent humanitarian spokesmen and women have, meanwhile, voiced their warnings against the unfolding humanitarian disaster in Gaza, including UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

Oxfam has warned against the “increasing desperation of Gazans as shortages of fuel, water and food are reported” and that “thousands of refugees across Gaza will face imminent cuts in water and sewage services if more fuel is not provided in the coming days and weeks.” The Israeli human rights group B’Tselem has called for opening Gaza’s borders “to prevent a humanitarian crisis.”

Israel completely controls the Gaza air space and territorial waters. Gaza’s foreign trade is conducted almost solely with Israel or via Israeli ports through five border-crossing points under Israeli control (Erez, Karni, Nahal Oz, Sufa, and Kerem Shalom), closed since June 10. Gaza’s industry is based on enterprises ninety-five percent of which rely on the import of raw materials. On July 26 The Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) meeting in Geneva demanded that Israel comply with the Protocol on Economic Relations between the Government of Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization.

The Rafah crossing point with Egypt, the only outlet of Gaza to the outside world, was closed in June, stranding more than 6,000 returning Palestinians on the Egyptian side for more than two months, which resulted in the death of 31 of them; more than 90 people, many of them seriously ill, who went to Egypt for treatment, were trapped at the airport, according to a joint statement by 12 human rights organizations active in occupied Palestinians territories.

Food shortage is another cause for concern. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) officials are anxious about running down their reserves. The World Food Program has also been noticing growing food insecurity in Gaza. The cancellation of the Gaza customs code by Israeli authorities meant that more than 1,300 containers of commercial materials destined for Gaza remained stranded at Israeli ports, and essential items such as milk powder, baby formula, vegetable oil and medical supplies are now in short supply.

US Ambassador Dennis Ross on Aug. 1 warned in the New Republic: “We cannot ignore that providing assistance to Gaza now requires someone to deal with Hamas. It need not be us, but total isolation and a cut-off could produce a humanitarian disaster. If we don’t want others in the international community to feel compelled to establish normal contacts with Hamas, we need to forge an international consensus on how to deal with the realities in Gaza.” There is a need, he says, to avoid a humanitarian crisis. “There may be a need to permit at least some limited commerce to prevent a complete economic collapse.”

However all these and other warnings are falling on deaf Israeli, American, European, Arab and even Palestinian ears. For example no word has so far been heard from the UN Human Rights Council’s Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, Jean Ziegler, to draw attention to the hunger in Gaza. May be he is waiting for hunger to bite more or waiting for an “official” word from the Palestinian Authority (PA), or others, to act on the looming disaster. The PA’s passive ambivalence seems to keep similar human rights organizations with enough excuse to stay disconnected.

— Nicola Nasser is a veteran Arab journalist based in Birzeit, Palestine.