U.N. agency to restart aid in Gaza after getting fuel

GAZA (Reuters) - A U.N. aid agency will resume deliveries of food to hundreds of thousands of Gaza Strip residents after obtaining enough fuel to last five days, a spokesman said on Monday.

Gaza has been in the grips of a fuel shortage for weeks, the result of sharp Israeli cutbacks in supplies to the Hamas-controlled territory as well as a strike by an association of Palestinian petrol owners over Israeli supply limits.

Israeli officials said attacks by Palestinian militants at border crossings have also forced them to temporarily close crossings used to provide supplies to Gaza's 1.5 million people.

Citing the fuel shortage, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) announced last Thursday that it was suspending operations, including food distribution.

Hamas' government in Gaza asked the petrol association on Sunday to resume deliveries, but the association refused.

UNRWA sent its own trucks on Monday to the Palestinian side of the Nahal Oz border crossing with Israel and filled them with 55,000 liters (12,100 gallons) of diesel, said Christopher Gunness, the aid agency's spokesman.

Gunness said that was enough for UNRWA to operate for about five days. "So we plan to resume food distribution tomorrow," he said, but added, "this, in no way, solves Gaza's fuel crisis."

The petrol delivery strike has prevented an estimated 1 million liters of diesel and petrol stored in tanks on the Gaza-side of Nahal Oz from being delivered to UNRWA and others, according to Israeli, Palestinian and Western officials.

(Reporting by Adam Entous; Editing by Mary Gabriel)