The delivery of aid to Palestinians is being starved due to the border controls, Unrwa says [AFP]

Israel had initially permitted the UN Relief and Works Agency to send 30 lorries of supplies to Gaza on Thursday but later reversed the agreement, citing a barrage of mortar fire by fighters in the enclave.

"They [Israel] have told us the crossings are closed today. At the end of today we will suspend our food distribution," Chris Gunnes, a spokesman for Unrwa, said on Thursday.

"Our warehouses are effectively empty."

Unrwa usually distributes emergency food rations to about 750,000 people in the Gaza Strip, half the population of the territory.

"Pushing people to the brink of desperation every few months and forcing Unrwa into yet another cycle of crisis management, is not in the interest of anyone who believes in peace, moderation and  stability," Gunness said.

Lorries turned back

The passage of humanitarian aid into Gaza has repeatedly been stopped over the last few days, aid agencies say, marking a turning point on Israel’s grip on the territory.

The International Committee for the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Thursday that Israeli border authorities had turned back its lorries from the Kerem Shalom crossing.

Truce under pressure

Gaza, which is controlled by Palestinian Hamas, has faced a crippling Israeli blockade in recent months.

Israel say the blockade is aimed at improving Israeli security from Palestinian rocket fire.

A six-month truce between Israel and Hamas has come under increasing strain in the last week, after Israeli forces entered Gaza in a move against a tunnel network used  by Palestinian fighters.

At least 11 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces in recent days, while more than 130 rockets have been fired from Gaza.

"The rockets are a natural response to [Israel's] aggression," Fawzi Barhoum, a Hamas spokesman, said.

Power cut

In another development, Israel cut off European Union-funded fuel supplies to Gaza's only power plant on Thursday.

"The plant will stop functioning at 6:30pm (1630 GMT) if Israel does not allow the supply of fuel today," Qanaan Obeid, an official from the Palestinian Energy Authority, said.

Between a quarter and a third of Gaza's power comes from the plant, with the remainder the supplied by Egyptian and Israeli national grids.

Katharina Ritz, mission leader for the ICRC, said that "every day the situation is getting more and more precarious for Gazans".

She said that medical equipment is in particularly short supply in the coastal territory.

Peter Lerner, an Israeli defence ministry spokesman, said that the closure of the Gaza crossings came in response to rocket fire.

Reopening the crossings "has been delayed because of the mortar shelling that impedes the proper functioning of the crossing points", he said.

Israeli has regularly sealed off the border points allowing access to Gaza in recent months, further limiting the already basic supplies it allows into the enclave.

The Israeli government first implemented a blockade of the territory after fighters loyal to Hamas, which Israel and the US deems a terrorist organisation, forced Palestinian Fatah fighters out of Gaza in June 2007.

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