The situation of Gazans remains desperate despite the hopes derived from Israel's recent commitments to increase aid, the humanitarian coordinator of the Gaza Strip declared this Friday. UN in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.
Jamie McGoldrick disputed Israeli claims that more than 1,000 trucks had entered Gaza in recent days, but only about 800 were received on the Palestinian side.
The veteran official noted that the system by which aid workers shared their coordinates with warring sides was “systematically inaccurate,” but that he raised these and other operational concerns with the Israeli military at their first meeting earlier this week.
“It is very easy for Israel to say we have sent you 1,000 trucks, so please deliver them to Gaza,” he said, in a new appeal to the Israeli authorities to recognize that their responsibility as an occupying power “only ends when aid arrives.” to the civilians of Gaza.
Safety vacuum
Describing long delays at checkpoints and the “security vacuum” within the enclave that continues to hinder the delivery of aid where it is needed most, the official noted that the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) team, whose vehicle was hit by live ammunition on Tuesday, was detained “for hours” at a checkpoint on the Salah Al Deen road.
So far this month, about 60 hours have been wasted this way, McGoldrick insisted. «And then, what happens sometimes is that it is too late, because you can only travel during the day, to go north and, therefore, sometimes the mission is canceled. And then Israel blames us for canceling the convoy, for canceling the mission to the north.
There are currently only three roads open to humanitarian aid in Gaza: the central route along the Salah Al Deen road, the Al Rashid coastal road and the military road on the eastern side of Gaza. “At no time in the last month or so have we had three or even two of these roads operating at the same time simultaneously,” said the coordinator, who added that all of them were in “very bad condition.”
The consequences of the “very limited” aid missions in the north of the enclave are already evident, judging by the low birth weight of babies, McGoldrick continued.
UN Humanitarian Coordinator Jamie McGoldrick (center) visits Kamal Adwan Hospital, the only pediatric hospital in northern Gaza.
Life-threatening hunger
Speaking from Jerusalem, he described his visit to Kamal Adwan Hospital two weeks ago, where “each and every patient” in the children's ward faced life-threatening hunger.
«The last child I saw was in an incubator and was a two-day-old child, but he was not born prematurely, he was born at nine months, but he weighed 1.2 kg. “There are going to be long-term consequences, which will affect the possibility of development of that child.”
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McGoldrick insisted on the need to have a direct telephone line with the Israeli Army “and the possibility of talking to them,” and noted that the attack on the convoy of the non-governmental organization World Central Kitchen two weeks ago is only recent evidence of the frequent dangers faced by aid teams operating in Gaza.
«We must have portable radios, VHF radios, all the things that you have in any normal matter, in a normal crisis. “We don't have them,” he said, maintaining that Israeli authorities had not allowed them for fear they could be used by Hamas fighters.
Call for evacuation
Echoing concerns about the dire health situation in Gaza, the World Health Organization (WHO) called for a structured system of medical evacuations to treat patients, instead of the current “ad hoc” system.
The damage suffered by the Al Shifa hospital, the largest in Gaza, during a two-week Israeli military raid had left a “huge crater” in the specialized surgery block, said Thanos Gargavanis, a trauma surgeon and head of emergencies at the hospital. agency.
There are currently only three roads open to humanitarian aid in Gaza: the central route along the Salah Al Deen road, the Al Rashid coastal road and the military road on the eastern side of Gaza.
Speaking from Gaza, Gargavanis said the hospital had been completely destroyed, including the oxygen plant, laboratory equipment and other critical equipment such as a CT scanner and other machines needed to provide life-saving care.
«The buildings themselves are burned, walls are missing; “There are shrapnel holes and fire everywhere,” the official said, before describing how an inspection of the hospital last week found open spaces full of makeshift graves or bodies lying uncovered or covered with plastic sheeting. .
The WHO and other UN agencies have ensured that the deceased found in Al Shifa can receive a dignified burial, by naming the bodies or making it possible to identify them through DNA testing in the future.
“After this destruction, we feel like we are going back to 60 years ago, when medical imaging was not available, when laboratory tests were not available,” Gargavanis said. “We want to insist that hospitals should never be militarized.”
