27 October 2025 | 10:15 CAT
4-minute read

Ceasefire in Name Only: Palestinians in Gaza Still Denied Lifesaving Aid and Dignity

Nearly two weeks after the Gaza ceasefire took effect, the suffering of Palestinians continues largely unabated. Despite international assurances that aid would pour in, Israel’s restrictions on medical supplies, food, and reconstruction materials have left Gaza’s hospitals overwhelmed, its families starving, and its cities still buried beneath rubble.

In this week’s Palestine Report, Moulana Ebrahim Moosa painted a stark picture of life under the so-called ceasefire — a truce on paper, but one that has done little to end Gaza’s humanitarian nightmare.

“The lack of basic medical supplies and equipment is such a great problem that only 10% of the requested medical supplies have entered Gaza since the ceasefire came into effect.”

Reports from the ground reinforce this grim assessment. According to the World Health Organisation, more than half of Gaza’s hospitals remain non-functional, with severe shortages of disinfectants, antibiotics, and fuel. Doctors describe scenes of patients lying on hospital floors or in makeshift tents, many suffering from infections caused by untreated wounds. The power cuts have made it impossible to refrigerate life-saving medicines like insulin, endangering thousands of lives.

While the ceasefire agreement promised up to 1 000 aid trucks a day, only about 90 are entering Gaza — and many of those are commercial, not humanitarian. The United Nations has confirmed that aid convoys are being selectively approved and diverted mainly to southern areas, leaving northern Gaza largely cut off. Moulana Moosa highlighted the cruel selectivity of what aid Israel allows in.

“Many of those trucks prioritise food of low nutritional value because it requires less coordination with the Israeli occupation authorities — meaning that high-protein foods, fruits, meat, poultry, etc., is definitely not entering in the desired quantities.”

International observers have condemned these tactics as a continuation of collective punishment, using starvation and deprivation as weapons of control. Palestinian families, many of whom have survived on canned goods and bread for months, now face malnutrition and disease. The UN has warned that nearly every one of Gaza’s 2,1 million people are in need of urgent humanitarian assistance.

At the same time, the political future of Gaza remains clouded. Palestinian factions — including Hamas and Fatah — have met in Cairo to discuss forming a technocratic government that would unify leadership across Gaza, the West Bank, and Jerusalem. The move represents a moment of unity, with Palestinian leaders agreeing on a shared vision for self-governance and reconstruction. But even these efforts are being undermined by Israel’s ongoing interference. Moulana Moosa voiced concern about this duplicity.

“Are you really going to support the technocratic government that Palestinians are putting forward when you are actually continuing to destroy buildings in the areas of Gaza that you occupy and embark on ceasefire violations and setting up parallel structures through these gangs?”

Recent investigations by Haaretz revealed that Israeli authorities have been dumping truckloads of waste, rubble, and scrap metal inside Gaza — a literal and symbolic insult to a population still grieving tens of thousands of dead and displaced. The act, described by rights groups as “environmental warfare,” reinforces Israel’s deep-seated dehumanisation of Palestinians and its contempt for international law.

Meanwhile, Western governments claim to be monitoring the ceasefire’s implementation through a “Civil-Military Coordination Center” — but its real impact on the ground remains negligible. While the world congratulates itself for brokered truces and reconstruction pledges, Gaza’s reality tells a different story: crushed infrastructure, suffocating restrictions, and a generation of Palestinians whose trauma continues long after the bombs stopped falling.

The ongoing blockade — now in its 18th year — has turned Gaza into “the world’s largest open-air prison.” Even after the genocide-level bombardment that killed over 40 000 Palestinians and displaced nearly two million, Israel maintains full control over Gaza’s borders, airspace, and sea access, dictating the entry of everything from fuel to food.

As Moulana Moosa’s report underscores, the ceasefire has brought quiet skies but not justice, nor true relief. It has only exposed the enduring cruelty of occupation — an occupation that extends beyond warfare into every aspect of Palestinian life: health, hunger, dignity, and self-determination.

For Palestinians, peace is not the absence of bombs; it is the presence of freedom, reconstruction, and the right to live as human beings. Until that becomes reality, the so-called ceasefire remains nothing more than another chapter in Gaza’s long history of betrayal by the world’s silence.

Listen to the Palestine Report on Sabaahul Muslim with Moulana Ibrahim Daya.