BEIT HANINA: The World Food Programme said Monday it would end monthly assistance to 500,000 people in Gaza due to a funding shortfall, despite acute needs in the war-battered Palestinian territory.
With the cutbacks, 1.1 million Palestinians in Gaza – still about half the population – will be receiving either food or cash assistance each month from the UN agency, in reduced amounts.
The World Food Programme said its efforts had mitigated the effects during a famine last year in Gaza – an evaluation of the situation disputed by Israel – and warned that conditions had not improved to the point that it can take away aid.
"This has been a lifeline. But now, rather than being able to sustain and scale up that assistance, we're actually having to reduce it," Shaun Hughes, the WFP country director, told AFP at the agency's office in east Jerusalem.
