\n<\/p>\n
\u201cDoctors, nurses, journalists, humanitarians, among them UNRWA staff, are hungry<\/strong>\u2026fainting due to hunger and exhaustion while performing their duties,\u201d<\/strong> said Juliette Touma, Director of Communications with\u00a0the UN agency for Palestine refugees, UNRWA.\u00a0<\/p>\n Speaking from Amman, she stressed that seeking food \u201chas become as deadly as the bombardments\u201d.<\/p>\n The development comes as the UN human rights office, OHCHR, announced on Tuesday that more than 1,000 Palestinians have now been killed by the Israeli military while trying to get food in the Strip since the so-called Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) started operating on 27 May.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cAs of 21 July, we have recorded 1,054 people killed in Gaza while trying to get food,\u201d said OHCHR spokesperson Thameen Al-Kheetan. \u201c766 of them were killed in the vicinity of GHF sites and 288 near UN and other humanitarian organizations\u2019 aid convoys.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Mr. Al-Kheetan noted that the finding came from \u201cmultiple reliable sources on the ground, including medical teams, humanitarian and human rights organizations. It is still being verified \u201cin line with our strict methodology.\u201d<\/p>\n The foundation\u2019s hubs are supported by the US and Israeli authorities and started operating in southern Gaza on 27 May, bypassing the UN and other established non-governmental organizations (NGOs).\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThe so-called GHF distribution scheme is a sadistic death-trap,\u201d UNRWA\u2019s Ms. Touma said. \u201cSnipers open fire randomly on crowds as if they’re given a license to kill.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Quoting a statement by UNRWA head Philippe Lazzarini, Ms. Touma called the scheme a \u201cmassive hunt of people in total impunity\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cThis cannot be our new norm. Humanitarian assistance is not the job of mercenaries,\u201d<\/strong> she added.<\/p>\n The UNRWA spokesperson insisted that the UN and its humanitarian partners have the expertise, experience and available resources to provide safe, dignified and at-scale assistance.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe have proven it time and again during the last ceasefire,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Living conditions in the Strip have reached a new low as prices for basic commodities have increased by around 4,000 per cent. For Gaza\u2019s inhabitants who have lost their homes and been displaced multiple times, they have no income and find themselves completely deprived of essentials.<\/p>\n A child waits for food in Gaza.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Ms. Touma highlighted the testimony of a colleague on the ground who had to walk for hours to buy a bag of lentils and some flour, paying almost $200 for it.\u00a0<\/p>\n On Monday, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) said that a quarter of Gaza\u2019s population faces famine-like conditions. Almost 100,000 women and children are suffering from severe acute malnutrition and need treatment as soon as possible.<\/p>\n Vital everyday items such as diapers are scarce and costly, at about $3 each. Mothers have resorted to using plastic bags instead while one father \u201csaid that he had to cut one of his last shirts to give his daughter sanitary pads\u201d, Ms. Touma said.<\/p>\n \u201cWe at UNRWA have stocks of hygiene supplies, including diapers for babies and for adults waiting outside the gates of Gaza,\u201d Ms. Touma stressed, insisting that the agency has 6,000 trucks loaded with food, medicines and hygiene supplies waiting in Egypt and in Jordan to be allowed into the enclave.<\/p>\n She reiterated the UN\u2019s calls for \u201ca deal that would bring a ceasefire, that would release the hostages, that would bring in a standard flow of humanitarian supplies into Gaza under the management of the United Nations, including UNRWA.\u201d<\/p>\n Humanitarian operations in the enclave are being pushed into an \u201cever-shrinking space\u201d, said World Health Organization (WHO) spokesperson Tarik Ja\u0161arevi\u0107.<\/p>\n Briefing journalists in Geneva, he condemned three attacks on Monday on a building housing WHO staff in Deir Al-Balah in central Gaza as well as the \u201cmistreatment of those sheltering there and the destruction of its main warehouse\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cStaff and their families, including children, were exposed to grave danger and traumatised after airstrikes caused a fire and significant damage,\u201d Mr. Ja\u0161arevi\u0107 said, adding that Israeli military entered the premises, \u201cforcing women and children to evacuate on foot\u201d towards the coastal shelter of Al Mawasi amid active conflict.\u00a0<\/p>\n The WHO spokesperson said that staff and family members were \u201chandcuffed, stripped, interrogated on the spot and screened at gunpoint\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n Two staff and two family members were detained and while three were later released, one WHO employee remains in detention for reasons unknown to the organization.<\/p>\n Mr. Ja\u0161arevi\u0107 called for the release of the detained staff member and insisted that \u201cno one should be held without charges and without due process.\u201d<\/p>\n The latest evacuation order for the area has impacted several WHO premises and compromised its presence on the ground, \u201ccrippling efforts to sustain a collapsing health system,\u201d Mr. Ja\u0161arevi\u0107 added, and \u201cpushing survival further out of reach for more than two million people\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n The Israeli military operation in Deir Al-Balah on Monday also caused an explosion and fire inside WHO\u2019s main warehouse, which is located within the evacuation zone in the central Gazan city, \u201cpart of a pattern of systematic destruction of health facilities\u201d, the agency\u2019s spokesperson said.<\/p>\n According to Gaza\u2019s health authorities, since the start of the war in October 2023, some 1,500 health workers have been killed in the Strip. Some 94 per cent of all health facilities have been damaged and half of Gaza\u2019s hospitals are \u201cnot functional at all\u201d, Mr. Ja\u0161arevi\u0107 said.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThe chance to prevent loss of lives and reverse immense damage to the health system slips further out of reach every day,\u201d he stressed.<\/p>\n Spotlighting further challenges to the humanitarian operation in Gaza, the WHO spokesperson pointed to an increase in the denial of visas by Israeli authorities for emergency medical teams seeking to enter the Strip since the breakdown of the latest ceasefire between Israel and Hamas on 18 March.\u00a0<\/p>\n He said that 58 international staff for the emergency medical teams, including surgeons and critical medical specialists, have been denied access.<\/p>\n UNRWA\u2019s Ms. Touma highlighted the fact that ever since the agency\u2019s Commissioner-General was denied entry to Gaza in March 2024, he has not been allowed back into the Strip. He has also not received a visa from Israel to enter the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, for more than a year.\u00a0<\/p>\n The UNRWA spokesperson also deplored the lack of access for international media to the enclave.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIt certainly is time, if not long overdue, for international media to go into Gaza precisely to look into the facts and to help with reporting first-hand information on the horrors that people in Gaza are living through,\u201d she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\nAid relief is not a job for mercenaries<\/strong><\/h2>\n
$200 for a bag of flour<\/strong><\/h2>\n
Urgent ceasefire call<\/strong><\/h2>\n
Screened at gunpoint<\/strong><\/h2>\n
Visa denials\u00a0<\/strong><\/h2>\n