(AFP) - United Nations Middle East peace envoy Nickolay Mladenov warned on Tuesday that Gaza was on the verge of "full collapse" and that a key to saving the Hamas-run area from disaster was restoring the government of Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas to power there. Speaking at the annual conference of Israel's Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv, he continued, "Without that Gaza risks exploding in our face again, this time in a far more deadly and violent manner than in the past."
Mladenov explained, "We're on the verge of a total systems failure in Gaza, with a full collapse of the economy, with social services, political, humanitarian and security implications stemming from that." He said he would raise those concerns in Brussels on Wednesday at a meeting of the Ad Hoc Liaison Committee, which coordinates international donor support for the PA.