The photograph above is an AP photo of a Palestinian boy who is waiting by his sick brother’s side with a manual air pump, for fear of the power going out and disabling the child’s electric respirator.

That is only a small glimpse of the reality for the powerless–in more than one sense of the word–in Gaza, as shared by Rory McCarthy in The Guardian.

He writes:

Israel said its closure of the Gaza strip was intended to halt the firing of makeshift rockets by Palestinian militants into southern Israel.

Yet Israel’s stark new policy has meant no fuel or food aid has come into Gaza since last Thursday. Large parts of the overcrowded strip had no power, leaving it without lights and heating, closing bakeries and forcing hospitals to rely on generators and their own limited fuel reserves. As night fell nearly all Gaza City was in darkness. Simply put, it was “collective punishment,” said the European commissioner for external relations, Benita Ferrero-Waldner.

Osama Nahal, a paediatric doctor in the European hospital’s special care baby unit, looked resigned. “Politics is politics, but the care of human beings must be away from politics,” he said. His unit now has 10 newly-born patients, of whom two are on ventilators.

Amira Hass from Ha’aretz has written a column detailing the dismal conditions of life in Gaza due to the Israeli-imposed embargo on electricity, fuels, and many foods and medicines.

Gaza Strip residents yesterday moved from worrying about the electricity cuts of the previous 40 hours to worrying about a water shortage. The municipality needs electricity to bring water to homes and the houses need it to pump water to the roof tanks.

Hence 40 percent of Gaza Strip homes - 600,000 people - had no running water yesterday, the Palestinian water authority said.

Oxfam International said yesterday that unless diesel and fuel supplies were resumed immediately, all the Strip’s water pumps could stop working today. The non-governmental organization also warned of the sewage system’s collapse in the absence of diesel.

“Without electric power we can manage somehow, without bread too,” says a resident of the Nasser neighborhood in northern Gaza. “It’s cold enough to prevent the food from going bad and we try to open the refrigerator as little as possible. The kids grumble but they can learn to live without the computer. But without water?”

Al-Jazeera has collected reactions to the Israeli embargo on Gaza from leaders around the world, including Benita Ferrero Waldner, the European Union external relations commissioner, who said that Israel was pursuing “collective punishment” against 1.5 million innocent people in Gaza.

The EU commissioner warned that neither the closure of Gaza’s border nor the deadly air raids and incursions of the past week would bring Israel security from rockets fired by Palestinian armed groups.

“Only a credible political agreement this year … can turn Palestinians away from violence,” she said.

The InterPressService gives us the sad story of Mustapha al-Jamal, who in light of the Israeli embargo of fuel, electricity, and most medical supplies to Gaza, is going door-to-door to find appropriate medicine for his sick son. Furthermore, Israel has refused medical treatment to Mustapha’s son (no suitable hospitals exist in Gaza) because they believe his oxygen tank is–you guessed it–a “security risk.”

Seventy-six-year-old Mustapha al-Jamal goes door to door, looking for help in finding medicines for his son.

At home, the 53-year-old son Yahya al-Jamal lies back, staring at the ceiling. By his side, an oxygen cylinder keeps him going for now.

“My son’s condition continues to worsen,” Mustapha says. “We’ve been waiting two months for the medicines.”

Last year Mustapaha’s 44-year-old daughter, a mother of six, died of breast cancer. She had been recovering, but the Israeli siege blocked supply of medicines, and no one could then save her.

Mustapha sees the same happening again. Yahya’s cancer started in his kidney, spread to his right lung, and now affects his liver.

Twice, on Jul. 20 and Oct. 2 last year, Yahya was allowed passage to Sourasky Medical Centre in Tel Aviv. On the second visit the hospital agreed to give the family 28 tablets worth 35,500 shekels (9,000 dollars).

Transfer to an Israeli hospital now could give Yahya medication and hope again, but Israeli officials have refused passage for medical care, citing the oxygen cylinder as a ’security risk’.

Contrary to international humanitarian law, the Israeli army has cut off electricity and fuel supplies to the 1.5 million people living in the Gaza Strip as “retaliation” to homemade projectile attacks that have caused mainly property damage in remote areas of Israel.

According to Ma’an News Agency:

Most of the Gaza Strip’s 1.5 million residents are spending the night without electricity as an Israeli-imposed blockade enters its fourth consecutive night.

The Gaza Strip’s only power plant shut down on Sunday due to a shortage of fuel.

“At least 800,000 people are now in darkness,” Derar Abu Sissi, general director of the plant, told reporters on Sunday night.

Supplies of food are running out, and the water and sewage systems are on the brink of collapse.