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UN aid teams on Friday highlighted the disturbing situation in Gaza’s makeshift hospitals, where premature babies cry for scant oxygen and medics attempt to save child survivors targeted by airstrikes in their tents and quadcopter victims reportedly shot while fetching bread.
Speaking from the war-shattered enclave amid the ongoing Israeli military push to take full control of Gaza City, UNICEF spokesperson James Elder described one short visit to a hospital where youngsters were either suffering or dying everywhere he looked.
One victim at Al Aqsa Hospital in Deir Al-Balah, central Gaza, was six-year-old Aya, injured by an airstrike. “I'm really noticing not just the wound, but the attention that the bobs in her hair, the care that a parent's given before the airstrike,” he said. “As we're talking to the surgeon there, she dies on the bed in front of us. That's 30 minutes in a hospital.”
"At the same hospital, Mr. Elder reported seeing three children “all shot by quadcopters” – an attack drone with four propellers. “It's a war zone, children ... bleeding out on the floor” with others wounded by shooting, shrapnel or burns.
The UNICEF spokesperson underscored reports that 1,000 infants have been killed in the last two years in Gaza since Hamas-led terror attacks in Israel triggered the war. “We have no idea how many more have died from preventable illnesses,” he continued.
With only around 14 of Gaza’s 36 hospitals still open and partially functional after almost two years of war, they are often “absolutely packed” with people needing help, Mr. Elder stressed.
“I turn around and there's a little girl, Sham, who has just been pulled from the rubble; so, she's covered in that dust and smoke with that terrified expression on her face, being held by an aunt or an uncle… Now Sham didn't have any broken bones nor internal injury, [she] was not told though that her mother and her sister were both killed in that attack.”
Turning to Gaza City, the veteran UN aid worker stressed that many thousands of people remain there, unable to leave, amid continuing Israeli evacuation orders airstrikes that have left children “shuddering” and gazing skywards “to track the fire” from helicopters and quadcopters.
“You've got shoeless children who push grandparents around the rubble, amputee children are struggling through the dust, mothers are carrying exhausted children whose literally their skin is bleeding because of the severity of rashes,” Mr. Elder continued, before warning about “continued indiscriminate attacks in densely populated civilian areas despite official statements”.
On Thursday, the NGO Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) confirmed the killing in Gaza of its fourteenth medical worker, occupational therapist Omar Hayek, in an attack that also injured four of his colleagues in Deir Al-Balah. Until 13 September he had worked at an MSF clinic in Gaza City before finally evacuating amid “relentless attacks and forced displacement from Israeli forces”, the NGO maintained.
“People are scared and rightly so… “If you ask me now, can we do our work? I say no, of course we cannot do our work in the north,” said Dr Rik Peeperkorn, UN World Health Organization (WHO) Representative in the Occupied Palestinian Territory. “What is happening in the north, I fear it will be very difficult to bounce back if this is continuing.”
The level of violence in Gaza is such that nowhere is safe, including field hospitals, which offer no protection from stray bullets, said Christian Cardon from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).
“We had several occasions of people being injured, brought to the hospital and while they were being treated, were wounded again because of stray bullets coming in the hospital,” he said, noting another such incident on Thursday.
ends
STORY: Gaza update – UNICEF, WHO
TRT: 03’24”
SOURCE: UNTV CH
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH/ NATS
ASPECT RATIO: 16:9
DATELINE: 03 OCTOBER 2025 GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
Speakers:
- UNICEF spokesperson James Elder (from Gaza)
- WHO Representative in the Occupied Palestinian territory Dr Rik Peeperkorn (from Gaza)
- ICRC Chief Spokesperson Christian Cardon
SHOTLIST
- Exterior wide shot: Palais des Nations, flag alley.
- Wide, podium speakers, UN Geneva Press room, remote speaker on TV screens.
- SOUNDBITE (English) – James Elder, UNICEF: “I went in and again, it's a war zone, children on the floor, there's a boy who'd been shot at GHF was bleeding out on the floor. You cannot…the sides of the corridors are absolutely packed.”
- Medium-wide, podium speakers, TV screen showing remote speaker.
- SOUNDBITE (English) – James Elder, UNICEF: “I'm talking about a little girl, Aya, who's six years old. I'm really noticing not just the wound, but the attention that, the bobs in her hair, the care that a parent's given before the airstrike. As we're talking to the surgeon there, she dies on the bed in front of us. That's 30 minutes in a hospital.”
- Wide, Press room, participants, TV screens showing remote speakers.
- SOUNDBITE (English) – James Elder, UNICEF: “I turn around and there's a little girl, Sham, who has just been pulled from the rubble; so, she's covered in that dust and smoke with that terrified expression on her face, being held by an aunt or an uncle. Now Sham didn't have any broken bones nor internal injury, Sham was not told though that her mother and her sister were both killed in that attack.”
- Medium-wide, podium speakers, TV screen showing remote speaker, journalists.
- SOUNDBITE (English) – James Elder, UNICEF: “You've got new mothers and vulnerable newborns who are lying on the floor, hospital corridors. I sat with three premature babies who were sharing a single oxygen source. They share it 20 minutes each, the other two children cry whilst the third child gets that oxygen for 20 minutes.”
- Medium-wide, podium speakers, TV screen showing remote speaker, participants.
- SOUNDBITE (English) – Dr Rik Peeperkorn, WHO: “People are scared. People are scared, and rightly so. I mean everyone. I mean, I've been many on these missions. Everyone is scared.”
- Wide, journalists, remote speaker on TV screen.
- SOUNDBITE (English) – Dr Rik Peeperkorn, WHO: “What is happening in the north, I fear it will be very difficult to bounce back if this is continuing.”
- Wide, podium speakers, UN logo backdrop.
- SOUNDBITE (English) – Christian Cardon, ICRC: “Again, very recently and that happened yesterday, stray bullets which obviously put in danger the patients and those working in the hospital; we had several occasions of people being injured, brought to the hospital and while they were being treated, were wounded again because of stray bullets coming in the hospital.”
- Wide, journalists, remote speaker on TV screen.
- SOUNDBITE (English) – James Elder, UNICEF: “Two days ago I was at Nasser Hospital and I saw children who've been paralyzed, who've been burnt and who've had amputations, all following direct hits on their tents or tents in the surrounding area, all at around two o’clock in the morning.”
- Wide, journalists and podium speakers, remote speaker on TV screen.
- SOUNDBITE (English) – James Elder, UNICEF: “We are very much in the throes of continued indiscriminate attacks in densely populated civilian areas, despite official statements leading to a demonstrable, very, very large numbers of girls and boys being killed and wounded.”
- Wide, Press room, journalists, control booths.
- SOUNDBITE (English) – James Elder, UNICEF: “Gaza City remains home to tens of thousands of children. So, you've got shoeless children who push grandparents around the rubble, amputee children are struggling through the dust, mothers are carrying exhausted children whose literally their skin is bleeding because of the severity of rashes.”
- Medium, journalist.
- Medium, journalists.
- Medium-wide, journalists, participants.
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