Gaza’s only electric power plan has begun shutting down today, Palestinian officials said. The shut down comes as a result of the fuel shortage caused by the Israeli blockade on the Hamas-controlled territory's borders. Israel imposed the blockade as a response to the Palestinian rocket attacks.

The effect of the electric shut down could be seen immediately as most of Gaza's buildings were left without light and with nonfunctional elevators. The blockade also caused a surging demand and a lack of supply, thus leaving most of the stores without goods to sell. The gas stations in Gaza, home to about 1.5 million people, have been shuttered because of Israeli cuts in petrol and diesel delivery.

The region’s power plant turned off one of its two turbines and the second would stop in the evening, said Kanaan Abeid, deputy chairman of the Palestinian Energy Authority in the Gaza Strip. As many as one million inhabitants would be affected by the full shutdown.

"There is no fuel coming in and we have no reserves," said Abeid for Reuters.

Daily rocket attacks were carried out by the Hamas militants, who launched the rockets from Gaza into Israel. The Hamas Islamists took control of the Gaza strip in June after routing President Mahmoud Abbas's secular Fatah faction.

Besides the blockade, Israel responded to Hamas’ rocket attacks through increasing air strikes and ground incursions. At least 39 Gazans, 18 of them Hamas militants, were killed in the process just over last week. The attacks brusquely escalated this week after an Israeli air strike killed a militant leader and his wife in northern Gaza.

There have been no reports of Israeli casualties from the militant rocket attacks.