JERUSALEM (ICN): Caritas Jerusalem, which has been distributing food, medicines and blankets to the people of devastated Jenin, says its workers were shocked at the conditions they found and the plight of the refugees.
‘Jenin is heartbreaking. It is shocking. I could not sleep after I visited there,’ said director of Caritas Jerusalem, Claudette Habesch.
‘I’m not angry, I’m very sad. Sad at what has happened and sad that the world appears to be ignoring the suffering of the Palestinian people. The world has to wake up to what has happened to the people of Jenin. It is a humanitarian disaster.
‘The hygiene is terrible. I had to walk through raw sewage because the sewage pipes have been destroyed. The smell of rotting corpses was overpowering. People have to live in this area, without rooms, without houses, without kitchens, without utensils, without blankets. We are very worried about disease’, Ms Habesch added.
The refugee camp at Jenin has seen some of the fiercest fighting in the West Bank during the past month. Palestinians claim civilians were massacred at the camp while Israeli officials say only a few dozen armed militants were killed. The UN is hoping to send a fact-finding mission to investigate.
But it is not just the immediate situation that concerns Caritas Jerusalem. It is also worried about the long-term effects of the recent violence.
