With this issue, themed Sustainable Gaza, This Week in Palestine intends to highlight a place and situation that indeed should put all of us to shame. The resilience and determination of Gazans is impressive. Yet their endurance cannot last forever, and we must find ways to support them, end the blockade, and return the once-thriving piece of land by the seaside to its former strength and beauty, allowing its residents to enjoy basic human rights and a life in dignity and prosperity!

Thanks go to UNDP not only for sustaining basic services in Gaza, but also for sponsoring this issue – and thus helping to sustain TWiP. In particular, we extend our gratitude to the authors who have contributed to this issue: Jamie McGoldrick, Humanitarian Coordinator and UN Resident Coordinator for the occupied Palestinian territory; H.E. Mufid Al Hasayna, Minister of Public Works and Housing; Iman Al Husseini, head of the Gaza infrastructure unit at UNDP/PAPP; Issam Younis, general director of the Gaza-based Al-Mezan Center for Human Rights and general commissioner of the Independent Palestinian Commission for Human Rights; Matthias Schmale, director of UNRWA field operations in Gaza; Hekmat El Khairy, Deputy Head of the Infrastructure Unit at UNDP/PAPP‘s Gaza Office, and Mahmoud Abu Aisha, monitoring and evaluation specialist for the Education Recovery Programme; Elizabeth Brownella, Engineering Program Manager at the MIT Global Engineering and Research Lab, and Gregor von Medeazza, chief of the Water, Sanitation and Hygiene program of the United Nations Children’s Fund for the State of Palestine; Clemens Messerschmid, hydrogeologist, author, and long-standing partisan in Palestinian water projects; Khader Shneiwra, executive director of the Palestinian Federation of Industries; and Mohammed Abu Mezyad, manager of UNDP projects related to eco-sustainable infrastructure, solid waste management, education, and municipal infrastructure. Thanks also to Visualizing Palestine for the infographics on Gaza.

Our personality and artist of the month are Yousri Alghoul and Tayseer Barakat, our book of the month presents Donald Macintyre’s Gaza: Preparing for Dawn. Our exhibition of the month features the series of exhibitions titled Retrospective, showing works by Samir Salameh, and TWiP kitchen features a typical Gazan salad recipe by the author of The Gaza Kitchen Laila El-Haddad. Explore and enjoy the events that are presented this month.

From the entire team at TWiP, we wish you a pleasant summer and all the best to the flotilla that set off from Norway to reach Gaza by the end of July to protest the ongoing siege.