Gaza sees longest continuous telecoms blackout since start of war

The Gaza Strip is witnessing its longest continuous telecommunications blackout since Israel’s war on the enclave began more than three months ago.

For nearly a week, Gaza has been without proper phone and internet services, which Palestinian telecoms provider Jawwal blames on Israel.

The blackout has left people in the enclave unable to communicate with the outside world amid an Israeli assault which has killed nearly 25,000 people - the vast majority women and children.

"Live metrics show the Gaza Strip has now been in the midst of a near-total telecoms blackout for 120 hours," cybersecurity monitor NetBlocks said on X.

"The disruption, now entering its sixth day, is the longest sustained telecoms outage on record" since the war began, it added.

The outages make humanitarian work harder and threaten to completely cut off Gaza from the rest of the world, hampering the flow of information and footage coming out of the besieged enclave.

There have been several communication blackouts since 7 October. Some have lasted for hours, while others have gone on for days.

Amnesty International says this is the ninth blackout since the start of the war.

"Communications blackouts put civilians in Gaza at risk, hamper rescue services and provision of humanitarian aid, and deprive people of access to lifesaving information," Amnesty wrote on X.

"These recurrent and life-threatening blackouts must not be normalised," it added.

Amnesty called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and asked people to sign a related petition.

Israel’s air and ground offensive in Gaza has obliterated most of the territory’s infrastructure.