UN Geneva - Multimedia Newsroom : Gaza update - Martin Griffiths

Gaza crisis: UN relief chief unveils 10-point plan ‘to rein in the carnage’

In response to the humanitarian crisis in Gaza amid the latest escalation with Israel, the UN’s top emergency relief official unveiled a 10-point plan on Wednesday “to rein in the carnage” there.

Martin Griffiths told journalists at UN Geneva that the initiative focused on a major expansion of aid into the wartorn enclave, along with a new call for humanitarian ceasefires and the release of hostages taken during Hamas’s 7 October terror attacks on Israel.

“Silence the guns, stop the fighting to allow the people to move safely, do it for as long as possible. Allow them to move safely on their own…Not hindered and not pushed.”

In a call to the warring parties and all those able to exert influence on them to heed the UN initiative, Mr. Griffiths underscored the need to ensure a safe and “continuous flow of aid convoys” into Gaza.

The initiative from veteran aid chief Martin Griffiths, head of the UN aid coordination office OCHA, comes more than five weeks since Hamas militants killed 1,200 people in Israel and took around 240 hostages.

“Release of the hostages is not part of a humanitarian plan”, he said. “It's an obligation on all those involved...I have always spoken publicly about the fact that these hostages need to be released unconditionally.”

The full-scale Israeli siege and assault that followed has levelled thousands of buildings in Gaza and reportedly claimed more than 11,000 civilian lives, according the Ministry of Health there.

Additional crossing points should be opened into the enclave, over and above Rafah from Egypt, according to the 10-point plan, and private sector suppliers should be included in this plan too.

“More crossing points, including that Kerem Shalom, which used to carry more than 60 per cent of the truckloads going through before this conflict, this recent outburst of conflict started”, emphasized Mr. Griffiths. “So please, Kerem Shalom, please, Israel, give us that for our crossing point.”

Access to fuel, a key requirement for all aid to flow, should also be made possible “in sufficient quantities” to deliver basic services, and the UN and partners should be allowed to expand the number of shelters available to all those forced from their homes in northern Gaza by the Israeli military’s evacuation order.

“Fuel is the driver of so many aspects of the humanitarian response,” underscored Mr. Griffiths. “It's the driver of desalination. It's the driver of electricity. It's the driver of effective hospitals. It's the driver of trucks that will go from Rafah on entry to the distribution points.”

On behalf of the humanitarian community that Mr. Griffiths represents, he urged all the parties, all those who have influence over them, and the broader international community to do everything in their power to support and implement the humanitarian plan.

“I haven't witnessed in my many, many decades of dealing with war an occasion on which so much attention is being paid to the requirements of international humanitarian law, otherwise called the rules of war,” said the top UN relief coordinator. “One of them is to allow people to go where they decide to go. They will decide where they're safe. They will decide when they want to move. And not move. And the same goes for us that we need safety to deliver aid to wherever those people go.”

Additional funding for the humanitarian response is also required, Mr. Griffiths pointed out, noting that it now amounts to $1.2 billion. UN and partner aid distribution hubs should also be permitted and civilians should be allowed “to move to safer areas and to voluntarily return to their residences”, he said.

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Gaza update - Martin Griffiths- UN Emergency Relief chief

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