Gazans consider the Strip 'unhabitable' now
A UN report has warned that Gaza may become uninhabitable by 2020, yet according to some Gazans the precarious security and living conditions make the coastal strip already unlivable.
BEIT HANOUN, Gaza Strip — Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip questioned the United Nations report that warned that Gaza might not be a livable place by 2020, in the belief that the Hamas-ruled coastal strip became uninhabitable years ago and that there is no need to wait five more years to make it official.
The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development predicted that the Gaza Strip could become “uninhabitable by 2020.” The report said this prognostication was based on the continuation of current economic trends in the Gaza Strip over the next five years.
The UN report also said, "The social, health and security implications of the high demographic growth and overpopulation are among the factors that may make Gaza uninhabitable by 2020.”
Maysa al-Masri, a mother of five living in the town of Beit Hanoun in the northern Gaza Strip, told Al-Monitor, “I feel scared when hearing about or reading such reports. I always think about emigrating, and I am constantly looking for a safe place for my family and myself.”
