As the volume of aid reaching the Gaza Strip remains woefully inadequate, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) called Friday on the Israeli authorities, other parties to the conflict and those with influence over them to safeguard an environment for safe and unimpeded delivery of humanitarian aid. According to the UN agency, the entire population of Gaza of 2.2 million people is now almost exclusively dependent on humanitarian assistance, including food.
On December 22, the UN Security Council (UNSC) passed its second resolution on Gaza. The 15-member body demanded the parties to the conflict to allow, facilitate and enable the immediate, safe and unhindered delivery of humanitarian assistance at scale directly to the Palestinian civilian population throughout the Gaza Strip. The Council also called for urgent steps to immediately allow safe, unhindered, and expanded humanitarian access and to “create the conditions for a sustainable cessation of hostilities”.
“Last week, intense diplomatic efforts led to UNSC resolution 2720, demanding immediate, safe and unhindered delivery of humanitarian assistance at scale directly to the Palestinian civilian population throughout the Gaza Strip. However, the delivery of much needed and urgent aid continues to be limited in quantities and riddled with logistical hurdles”, said Philippe Lazzarini, UNRWA Commissioner General, in a statement Friday.
The entire population of the Gaza Strip - more than two million people - is affected by acute hunger and is at immediate risk of famine. The bombardment, ground operations and siege of the entire population, combined with the restriction of humanitarian access, have led to catastrophic acute food insecurity, increasing the risk of famine every day. More than 500,000 people are already affected by catastrophic conditions.
“The recent assessments on hunger in Gaza should not therefore come as a surprise, given very low supplies and the near total collapse of the private sector, including commerce and shops. The entire population of Gaza of 2.2 million people is now almost exclusively dependent on humanitarian assistance, including food”, Lazzarini said.
"I call on the Israeli Authorities, other parties to the conflict and those with influence over them to safeguard an environment for safe and unimpeded delivery of humanitarian aid (..)," he added.
Meanwhile, heavy Israeli bombardment from air, land, and sea, continue across most of the Gaza Strip. Ground operations and intense fighting between Israeli forces and Palestinian armed groups, with indiscriminate and disproportionate airstrikes and missiles hitting housing units and infrastructure, result in high numbers of civilian fatalities.
Since October 7, more than 21,600 Palestinians have been killed and more than 56,000 wounded in attacks by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). About 70 percent of those killed are said to be women and children. Thousands of people - including thousands of children - have been reported missing and may be still trapped dead or alive under the rubble.
Among those killed in Gaza are at least 144 UN staff, 312 health workers and 106 journalists.
At least 60 percent of all housing units in the Gaza Strip, a densely populated area, have been either destroyed or damaged since the start of the hostilities. This includes more than 65,000 housing units destroyed and more than 290,000 damaged. Entire residential neighborhoods have been razed to the ground.
The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) warns that the intensity of the fighting in Gaza continues to impede ongoing efforts to provide health care and other life-saving assistance to civilians. Insecurity, blocked roads, and fuel shortages also hamper humanitarian operations, as do frequent disruptions to telecommunications.
In a social media post Friday, the UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, Martin Griffiths, described the situation in Gaza as “impossible” for people in need and those trying to help them, he called for a stop to the fighting, stressing the many major obstacles to getting aid into and across Gaza.
Griffiths pointed to the multiple inspections required, long queues of trucks, and difficulties at crossing points. Inside Gaza, he underscored that aid operations face constant bombardments, with aid workers themselves killed, and said some convoys have been shot at.
Israeli soldiers fired at an aid convoy Thursday as it returned from Northern Gaza along a route designated by the Israeli Army. The international convoy leader and his team were not injured, but one vehicle sustained damage.
“I strongly condemn an incident yesterday in which an aid convoy was fired upon while traveling from northern Gaza to Rafah. The convoy was clearly marked, and its movements were coordinated with the parties. Attacks on humanitarian workers are unlawful. The conflict must stop,” Griffiths said in a social media post Friday.
UN agencies and other humanitarian agencies say they continue to do all they can to meet the growing needs of civilians in Gaza. Thursday and Friday, the World Food Programme (WFP) – together with UNRWA and partner organizations - conducted a large-scale food distribution for some 10,000 displaced families in makeshift camps in Rafah, with enough supply for 10 days.
OCHA reports that an estimated 100,000 internally displaced people (IDPs) have recently arrived in Rafah, amid an intensification of hostilities in Khan Younis and Deir al Balah, as well as evacuation orders by the Israeli army.
By the end 2023, some 1.9 million people – more than 85 percent of the total population of Gaza - have been displaced – often multiple times - due to the attacks by the Israeli military or Israeli evacuation orders. Nearly 1.4 million civilians are sheltering in 155 UNRWA installations in increasingly dire conditions. UNRWA shelters are accommodating far more people than their intended capacity. Overcrowding is leading to the spread of disease, including acute respiratory illness and diarrhea.
The Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs warned this week that Gaza is a public health disaster in the making, with infectious diseases spreading fast in overcrowded shelters. In a social media post, Griffiths said hospitals are barely functioning and unable to provide care to hundreds of people injured by the ongoing fighting.
As intense Israeli bombardments continue across most of the Gaza Strip, the World Health Organization (WHO) reports Gaza has 13 partially functioning hospitals, 2 minimally functioning ones, and 21 that are not functioning at all. Nine of them are in the south, where they are operating at three times their capacity, while facing critical supply and fuel shortages. In the north, four hospitals are providing maternity, trauma and emergency care services, despite a lack of staff and medical supplies, as well as fuel, food and drinking water.
A public health catastrophe is rapidly evolving in Gaza with high levels of violent deaths and injuries, mass displacement, overcrowding, major disruption and dysfunction of the health system, and damage to water and sanitation infrastructure. Severe stressors for mental health are affecting the whole population, including bombardment and siege. Destruction and hostilities are gravely obstructing ambulance access to the injured and health facilities.
On Friday, the head of the WHO in the occupied Palestinian territory (OPT) announced that people living in shelters in Gaza continue to fall ill. Close to 180,000 people are suffering from upper respiratory infections; there are 136,400 cases of diarrhea; 55,400 cases of lice and scabies; 5,330 cases of chickenpox; 42,700 cases of skin rash (including 4,722 cases of impetigo); 4,683 cases of Acute Jaundice Syndrome; and 126 cases of meningitis.
On October 7, Palestinian armed groups in Gaza, including fighters from the militant Hamas group, launched thousands of rockets toward Israel and breached through a perimeter fence of Gaza at multiple locations. Members of armed groups entered into Israeli towns, communities, and military facilities near the Gaza Strip, killing and capturing Israeli forces and civilians.
More than 1,200 Israelis and foreign nationals, most of them civilians, were reportedly killed and more than 5,400 injured, most of them on October 7. Some 240 people, including Israelis and foreign nationals, were held hostage in Gaza. More than 100 of the Israeli hostages have since been released, most of them during a weeklong truce agreement between Israel and Hamas.
Following heavy bombardments by Israeli Forces, from the air, sea and land, the humanitarian situation of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip drastically deteriorated. The merciless attacks by the IDF and the blockade imposed on Gaza by the Israeli government has led to an ongoing humanitarian catastrophe for the people of the tiny enclave.
Further information
Full text: The Gaza Strip: UNRWA calls for unimpeded and safe access to deliver much needed humanitarian aid, statement from Philippe Lazzarini, UNRWA Commissioner General , released December 29, 2023
https://www.unrwa.org/newsroom/official-statements/gaza-strip-unrwa-calls-unimpeded-and-safe-access-deliver-much-needed
Full text: Hostilities in the Gaza Strip and Israel, Flash Update #81, UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, report, released December 30, 2023
https://www.ochaopt.org/content/hostilities-gaza-strip-and-israel-flash-update-81