The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) confirmed this Sunday the death of at least ten minors due to dehydration and malnutrition in the north of the Gaza Strip.
These deaths have been recorded at the Kamal Adwan Hospital in recent days, although it has not surprised health and humanitarian personnel. “We feared that there would be deaths of children here because malnutrition plagues the Gaza Strip,” said UNICEF regional director for the Middle East and North Africa, Adele Khodr.
“There are probably more children fighting for their lives in the few remaining hospitals in Gaza,” he warned, while denouncing that these “tragic and horrific deaths are the work of human beings, predictable and entirely avoidable.”
“The widespread lack of nutritious food, safe water and health services is a direct consequence of the impediments to access and the multiple dangers faced by UN humanitarian operations and affects children and mothers, their ability to breastfeed. their babies, particularly in the Gaza Strip. People are hungry, exhausted and traumatized,” she explained.
Khodr has highlighted the “disparity” of conditions in the north and south of the enclave resulting from “restrictions on aid” that “cost lives in the north.” Almost 16 percent of children under two years of age suffer from malnutrition, according to January data for the northern Gaza Strip. In the south this figure drops to 5 percent.
Humanitarian organizations have warned of the possible consequences since October and if measures are not taken and the war ends “child deaths will increase rapidly.”
“Lifesaving help is just a few kilometers away. They keep her out of reach, but the worst thing is the anguished screams of the babies who slowly die under the gaze of the world,” she reproached.
The United Nations Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) has echoed the data published by UNICEF.
“Gaza has become hell on earth. When will the world say enough is enough? ”She has posed on her Twitter account.
The authorities of the Gaza Strip, controlled by the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas), have raised this Sunday to 30,410 Palestinian deaths due to the military offensive launched by Israel against the enclave after the attacks carried out on October 7 by the Islamist group.
Israel launched its offensive against the enclave after the aforementioned Hamas attacks, which left 1,200 dead and 240 kidnapped. Added to these death tolls are more than 400 Palestinians killed in the West Bank and East Jerusalem at the hands of Israeli security forces and in attacks carried out by settlers.