UN: Israel must allow full access for aid, supplies to rehabilitate Gaza

Much freer access for goods and staff is needed, Holmes, who also serves as UN emergency relief coordinator, declared. While Israel has allowed increased shipments of basic commodities with 120 truckloads getting in on good days, the normal daily requirement is a minimum of 500. Many humanitarian workers continue to be refused regular entry.

If aid workers continue to face rigid limits on their movement and essential items such as construction materials, pipes, electrical wires and transformers are kept out, the lives of the Gazan people cannot significantly improve, he said.

The under-secretary-general also emphasized that Hamas must refrain from any interference with the movement or distribution of humanitarian goods, noting that reconciliation between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority, which it ousted from Gaza in 2007, would best facilitate relief and recovery activities.

"The people of Gaza have continued to exist in what is effectively a giant open-air prison, without normality or dignity," he said. "Their lives have been put at risk recklessly by indiscriminate rocket attacks from their midst, which have also killed, injured and traumatized Israeli civilians in Southern Israel. They have now endured a terrifying assault, and must live with its devastating aftermath."

"This is not sustainable or acceptable. It can only lead to more despair, suffering, death and destruction in the coming years, and perhaps fatally undermine the two-state solution we all seek," he added, referring to the roadmap plan for Israel and Palestine to live side by side in peace.

"It must therefore be in the long term interests of all parties, including Israel, to ease conditions for the people of Gaza, by opening the crossings, facilitating the provision of assistance, and allowing them to live, work and hope again," he said.