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A total of 645 people have died since 7 October and another 818 were injured as a result of these incidents, said WHO spokesperson Tarik Jasarevic, his comments coming amid allegations that a nurse was shot and critically injured while inside an operating theatre at a hospital in Khan Younis.
“These attacks have affected 98 healthcare facilities including 27 hospitals damaged out of 36 and affected 90 ambulances, including 50 which sustained damage,” Mr. Jazarevic told journalists in Geneva.
Driven out
In its latest update on the crisis, the UN aid coordination office, OCHA, reported more “intense fighting” in Khan Younis in southern Gaza on Thursday involving shelling and heavy gunfire.
Citing UN partner the Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PCRS), the UN aid coordination office said that Nasser hospital and Al Amal hospital – reportedly under siege for 17 days - had continued to be particularly badly affected by the violence which “is driving thousands of people” from the city further south, to Rafah.
Hospital focus
The OCHA update also relayed reports from the Gazan health authority of continuing “allegations of sniper shooting in the vicinity of Nasser hospital” and allegations that the Israeli military had prevented the movement of ambulances and access to Nasser hospital.
“On 8 February, a nurse was reportedly shot and critically injured while inside the operations room in Nasser hospital and two Palestinians were reportedly shot and killed in the vicinity of the hospital,” the OCHA update said. “On 7 February, a Palestinian woman was reportedly shot and killed while purportedly fetching water from Nasser hospital.”
West Bank escalation
Latest WHO data also highlighted the growing number of attacks on healthcare in the occupied West Bank since the Gaza-Israel war erupted on 7 October, after widely condemned Hamas-led terror attacks left 1,200 Israeli and foreign nationals butchered and more than 250 taken hostage.
Some 364 attacks (on healthcare) have happened in the West Bank, resulting in 10 fatalities and 62 injuries, Mr. Jasarevic said. He noted that 44 health facilities had been affected, including 15 mobile clinics and 24 ambulances.
The latest toll from the fighting in Gaza is at least 27,840 fatalities with more than 67,300 injured, according to the local health authority. As of 8 February, 225 Israeli soldiers have been killed with 1,314 injured in Gaza since the beginning of the ground operation, according to the Israeli military.
Renewed famine fears
UN humanitarians continued to highlight that the risk of famine in Gaza is increasing “by the day”, particularly in northern Gaza.
Hundreds of thousands of people there have been “predominantly cut off from assistance”, OCHA said, despite the fact that this is where the greatest needs are, with many reportedly grinding animal feed to make flour.
Since the onset of the crisis, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) has delivered 1,940 trucks - 19 per cent of all aid trucks, it said - carrying over 32,413 tons of life-saving food supplies.
The last time UNRWA was able to carry out a food distribution in the north of Wadi Gaza was 23 January, OCHA’s update noted.
Buffer rebuff
And as UN humanitarians reiterated deep concerns on Friday about any further escalation of fighting in overcrowded Rafah in the far south of the Gaza Strip, the UN human rights office, OHCHR, insisted that any reported attempt by Israel to create a “buffer zone” with Gaza could constitute a war crime.
“Article 53 of the Geneva Convention prohibits destruction by the occupying power of property belonging to private persons, except where such destruction is rendered absolutely necessary by military operations,” said OHCHR spokesperson Marta Hurtado. “Destruction carried out to create a buffer zone for general security purposes do not appear consistent with the …military operations.”
Commando comment
Asked for a reaction to an Israeli counter-terrorism operation inside a West Bank hospital that left three Palestinian militants dead late last month, Ms. Hurtado noted that the Israeli Security Forces had claimed that one of those targeted had a gun - “ a claim denied by hospital staff. No exchange of fire was reported. Under applicable international human rights law, firearms may only be used when strictly necessary to prevent an imminent threat to life or serious injury and is otherwise unlawful.”
STORY: Gaza update: WHO, OHCHR
TRT: 02 min 13s
SOURCE: UNTV CH
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS
ASPECT RATIO: 16:9
DATELINE: 9 FEBRUARY 2024 GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
SHOTLIST
- Exterior medium shot: UN flag alley
- Wide shot: speakers at the podium during a press conference
- SOUNDBITE (English) – Tarik Jasarevic, UN World Health Organization (WHO) spokesperson: “WHO has documented 721 attacks on health care in the Occupied Palestinian Territory since 7 October. Out of those 721, 357 attacks in the Gaza, resulting in 645 fatalities and 818 injuries.”
- Medium shot: press room with journalists
- SOUNDBITE (English) – Tarik Jasarevic, UN World Health Organization (WHO) spokesperson: “Health facilities are protected under international humanitarian law. And we keep really repeating our appeal to all parties to the conflict to respect that the health workers, ambulances, hospitals, patients should never be a target and should be protected.”
- Medium shot: press room with journalists
- SOUNDBITE (English) – Tarik Jasarevic, UN World Health Organization (WHO) spokesperson: “These attacks have affected 98 health care facilities, including 27 hospitals damaged out of 36, and affected 90 ambulances, including 50 which sustained damage.”
- Wide shot: press room with journalists
- SOUNDBITE (English) - Marta Hurtado, spokesperson, Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR): “The (Israeli Security Forces) also claimed that one of them had a gun, a claim denied by hospital staff. No exchange of fire was reported. Under applicable international human rights law, firearms may only be used when strictly necessary to prevent an imminent threat to life or serious injury and is otherwise unlawful.”
- Wide shot: press room with journalists
- SOUNDBITE (English) - Marta Hurtado, spokesperson, Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR): “Article 53 of the Fourth Geneva Convention prohibits destruction by the occupying power of property belonging to private persons, except where such destruction is rendered absolutely necessary by military operations. Destructions carried out to create a buffer zone for general security purposes do not appear consistent with the narrow military operations.”
- Medium shot: press room with journalists, interpreters working.
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As world’s water reserves change, countries must prepare for a new reality: WMO
New data showing that rivers were at their lowest level for decades last year provides further evidence that the climate crisis is real and countries must act immediately to protect themselves from the increasing threat to communities and livelihoods, the UN World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said on Thursday.
The key findings from WMO’s State of Global Water Resources 2025 report covering the hydrological cycle and extreme events in the five-year period to last year:
- 2025 was one of driest years for river discharge in 35 years
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- Water storage on Earth’s land surface has decreased in past decade
- Widespread glacier loss across all regions for fourth consecutive year
- Asia and Africa are regions most affected by water-related disasters
- Water data availability has improved, but gaps remain in hard-hit areas
Highlighting the long-term decline in the Earth’s freshwater storage and glacier melt, WMO Secretary-General Celeste Saulo explained that the planet’s water reserves used to act as a planetary “savings account” that absorbed the occasional dry season, avoiding a water crisis. “One of the central stories of the 2025 report is what is happening to that savings account? And the simple answer is that we are depleting it,” she told journalists in Geneva.
Groundwater reserves are equally stretched and have been in decline since 2014, WMO’s report states, with nearly two-thirds of monitored wells worldwide showing levels lower than the historical norm and indicating a shift “further toward deficit…not recovery”.
“At the same time, we are seeing more water-related disasters,” Ms. Saulo said, while also stressing that the currently strengthening El Niño “will increase the risk of drought in some areas, and flooding in others”.
Glaciers disappearing
In 2025, for the fourth consecutive year, every major glaciated region on Earth lost ice mass, leading to short-term hazards including floods and long-term water insecurity, according to WMO.
Responding to a question about whether the changing global water cycle might have contributed to the deadly Nepal-China flooding disaster, Ms. Saulo explained that melting ice and rock was just one factor in the chain of events that ultimately sent a massive and deadly wall of water and debris downstream on 26 August, killing at least 1,367 people.
“You asked if it could happen again? Absolutely; the problem in this region is that there’s 63,700 glaciers at the last count,” she told a Press Conference in Geneva. “Even if you’re looking with remote sensing with satellites at these glaciers, you might see some faults, you might see some slight shifting, that does not mean necessarily catastrophic collapse. So, in order to plan for this, it’s very, very difficult. But the international community is looking very hard at ways in which we can bring people together to solve some of these monitoring issues.”
Data indicates that glaciers shrank between 2023 and 2025 with cumulative losses of 1,400 gigatonnes of water – or about one third of annual fresh water needs.
Every major glacier region on Earth lost ice for the fourth consecutive year.
“All 19 glacier regions around the globe lost ice; in Central Asia, Iceland, the Russian Arctic and western Canada and the United States, it was among the three worst years on record,” said Wayne Jenkinson, WMO’s Director of Hydrology and Cryosphere.
Some regions with smaller glaciers such as Central Europe, the Caucasus, the western Canada and the United States may already have reached “peak water”, Mr. Jenkinson warned.
“After this point, the glacier gives less meltwater each year simply because there is less ice left to melt. That matters for every community downstream that relies on water during hot, dry summers,” he explained.
Narelle van der Wel, WMO’s Head of Cryosphere Monitoring, Predictions and Services, stressed that while some further glacier loss is unavoidable, the eventual scale of the decline is not predetermined.
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Preparing for moving baselines
The report does not attribute every observed change to climate change alone. WMO says pressure on water resources and natural variability also contribute.
Mr. Jenkinson said governments need to prepare for “moving baselines” as historical patterns become less reliable.
“The situation 30 years ago is not where we are today,” he said. Countries, he added, need to prepare “for those changes that have really already arrived”.
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