A ‘humanitarian pause’ in Gaza will just prolong our suffering | Ibrahim Muhtadi

We are living amid death and devastation. What good is sending in aid if the killing resumes afterwards?

Living in Gaza, we wake up feeling grateful every morning to have survived for one more day. For more than 30 days, we have lived surrounded by death, devastation and desperation. To say that the situation is exceptional does not begin to describe the reality of nonstop Israeli bombardments, huge missile strikes from air, land, and sea, and the collective struggle to stay alive. Nowhere in the Gaza Strip is safe. More than 11,000 people have been killed - over 4,500 of them children.

When I hear the phrase humanitarian pause", it sounds like a farce. How can it be that when we are in the worst imaginable crisis, some leaders call for a pause and not a ceasefire?

Ibrahim Muhtadi is an architect, designer and business developer