If there is a hell on earth today, its name is northern Gaza, UN humanitarians say
After reports that Israel has agreed to implement four-hour pauses in the fighting in areas of northern Gaza to allow civilians to move south, UN humanitarians on Friday reiterated urgent calls for a humanitarian ceasefire and unimpeded, secure access of aid deliveries into the Palestinian enclave.
“If there is a hell on earth today, its name is northern Gaza. People who remain there, the corners of their existence is death, deprivation, despair, displacement and, literally, darkness,” said Jens Laerke, spokesperson for the UN’s humanitarian affairs coordination office, OCHA. He added that “the entire” Gaza Strip had been plunged into darkness since 11 October, when the electricity grid was shut down and fuel was stopped from entering.
OCHA reported that hundreds of thousands of people remaining in the north continue to struggle to find the bare minimum of water and food to survive. All municipal water wells have shut down again due to the lack of fuel, halting the supply of water for domestic non-drinking uses.
An Naser Children’s Hospital in Gaza city was hit during an airstrike, reportedly killing three people and injuring dozens more.
“What do you tell your children in such a situation? It's almost unimaginable that the firework that they see in the sky is out to kill them, because that's what it looks like. So, of course, we advocate for a humanitarian pause, for a humanitarian ceasefire that covers the entirety of the of the Strip,” Mr. Laerke told reporters at the United Nations in Geneva.
OCHA reported that on Wednesday some 50,000 people fled areas to the north of Wadi Gaza, a valley that separates the northern from the southern part of Gaza, through a “corridor” opened by the Israeli military. Images showed people walking, pushing wheelchairs with elderly and displaced people, or using donkey karts. The development will only worsen the already massively overcrowded facilities of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) whose facilities are already overwhelmed by the number of people seeking refuge from Israeli bombardments.
“We have heard that some facilities are at full-time capacities. Other facilities are at 10 times capacities. We hear stories of one toilet per 160 people, one shower per 700 people. These are just mind-boggling figures. And it gives you an idea of the day-to-day human challenges in terms of preserving people's human dignity,” Mr. Laerke said.
According to OCHA, prior to the current crisis, 500 trucks a day on average crossed into the enclave. Mr. Laerke noted that “yesterday, a total of 65 trucks carrying food, medicines, health supplies, bottled water, blankets and hygiene products, as well as seven ambulances crossed from Egypt into Gaza via the Rafah crossing. That brings the total number of trucks that have entered Gaza since the 21st of October to 821.”
Amid fresh reports on Friday morning that a yard at the Al Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, where thousands of displaced Palestinians were sheltering, was struck by bombardments, Dr. Margaret Harris, spokesperson for the UN World Health Agency (WHO) said that 20 out of a total of 36 hospitals in Gaza had been destroyed.
“We've lost 20 (hospitals), that means we've got 16 (remaining). But [they] are not functioning in the way you or I would recognize a hospital functioning,” said Dr. Harris. “They are managing to keep the bare minimum of services and receive people. But they are not being able to function where they do not have any of the adequate supplies. They do not have the anesthetic medications. They do not have the disinfectants, and they are massively, massively overcrowded.”
WHO said they are “desperately concerned” about the levels of infectious diseases. The WHO reported that they are seeing diarrhoea rates surging massively. “We normally see 2,000 cases per month. We're seeing over 22,000, cases and huge numbers of respiratory infections that still spread everywhere.”
In addition, WHO’s Dr. Harris reported that “we are seeing crush injuries, burns and yes, indeed, people have severe damage to their bones, having been under rubble, having been crushed.”
The WHO spokesperson reiterated that “once we have access, I'm sure orthopedic surgeons will be very, very welcome. But the critical thing, as I said, is we need safe access and a means to provide those teams in a way where they can truly support the health system and that the beleaguered doctors and nurses who are doing extra ordinary things under impossible conditions.”
-ends-
STORY: Humanitarian crisis in Gaza - OCHA - WHO
TRT: 3:54”
SOURCE: UNTV CH
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH
ASPECT RATIO: 16:9
DATELINE: 10 November 2023 - GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
SHOTLIST
1
1
1
Edited News | UNWOMEN
Aid agencies echoed wider warnings of growing signs of widespread starvation in Gaza on Tuesday, as UN-partnered international food security experts released their most dire assessment yet of the situation in the wartorn enclave.
1
1
1
Edited News | IOM , UNDP , UNHCR
Sudan: urgent help needed as more than 1.3 million war-displaced people begin to return home
As conflict rages on across parts of Sudan, pockets of relative safety have emerged in the past four month, spurring more than one million internally displaced Sudanese to make their way home, says the International Organization for Migration (IOM). A further 320,000 cross-border refugees have come back to Sudan since last year, mainly from Egypt and South Sudan, to assess the current situation before deciding to return to their country for good.
1
1
1
Edited News | UNRWA , WHO
Gaza: SOS messages describe people fainting from hunger; UN health worker detained
Worrying alerts from United Nations staff in Gaza who have been fainting from hunger and exhaustion over the past 48 hours have increased fears for people’s survival in the devastated enclave, UN humanitarians said on Tuesday.
1
1
1
Edited News | UNHCR , UNOG
Over 11.6 million refugees risk losing aid access due to funding cuts, says UNHCR
Approximately one in three refugees and other vulnerable individuals normally supported by the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) are expected to lose out from funding cuts, it said on Friday.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR
Ravina Shamdasani, Spokesperson for the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, made the following announcement on the Office’s opening of a new mission in Bangladesh.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR
“The surge in the number of Afghans forced or compelled to return to Afghanistan this year is creating a multi-layered human rights crisis requiring the urgent attention of the international community,” UN Human Rights spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani said on Friday.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
UN Human Rights Chief Volker Türk on Friday called for accountability and justice for the killings and other gross human rights violations and abuses in the southern city of Suweida.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR , UNHCR
Syria: hundreds killed in Sweida, ‘widespread’ violations as civilians flee for their lives
Amid violent clashes in southern Syria’s Sweida governorate, a picture of grave human rights abuses and rising humanitarian needs is emerging by the hour, the UN said on Friday.
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
At the bi-weekly press briefing in Geneva the UN Human Rights Spokesperson Liz Throssell made the following statement on the latest number of civilian casualties in Ukraine.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
The UN Human Rights Office on Tuesday called for investigations into hundreds of killings of Palestinians in the occupied West Bank by Israeli security forces and settlers, warning against ongoing forced mass displacement of the Palestinian population.
1
1
2
Edited News | OHCHR , UNRWA
Nearly 900 people have been killed in Gaza in recent weeks trying to fetch food, with most deaths linked to private aid hubs run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), the UN human rights office, OHCHR, said on Tuesday.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
The United Nations Integrated Office in Haiti (BINUH) and the UN Human Rights Office have today released a report detailing the evolution of violent gang incidents beyond the capital Port-au-Prince since October 2024 up to June 2025, and the resulting loss of life and mass displacement.