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Tag: Save the Children

  • Over 20,000 Children Missing in Gaza, With ‘Unknown Number’ in Mass Graves: Report

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    Original article by JAKE JOHNSON republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

    A woman stands holding a child surrounded by the rubble of buildings destroyed by Israeli airstrikes in Khan Younis, Gaza on June 23, 2024.
     (Photo: Eyad Baba/AFP via Getty Images)

    “No parent should have to dig through rubble or mass graves to try and find their child’s body,” said the Save the Children’s regional director for the Middle East.

    The humanitarian group Save the Children estimated Monday that around 21,000 kids are missing in the Gaza Strip as Israel’s military continues its assault on the enclave, reducing much of the Palestinian territory to rubble.

    Roughly 4,000 kids are likely buried under that debris, according to Save the Children, while at least 17,000 are unaccompanied, an “unknown number” are in mass graves, and others have been “detained and forcibly transferred out of Gaza, their whereabouts unknown to their families amidst reports of ill-treatment and torture.”

    A child protection specialist with Save the Children said that the group finds more unaccompanied children every day in Gaza, where parents and entire families have been wiped out by Israel’s relentless bombing campaign and ground invasion.

    “We work through partners to identify separated and unaccompanied children and trace their families, but there are no safe facilities for them—there is no safe place in Gaza,” said the Save the Children specialist. “Besides, reuniting them with family members is difficult when ongoing hostilities restrict our access to communities, and constantly force families to move.”

    “Neighbors and extended family members who have taken in lone children are struggling to meet their basic needs, such as shelter, food, and water,” they added. “Many are with strangers—or completely alone—increasing the risk of violence, abuse exploitation, and neglect.”

    “We desperately need a cease-fire to find and support the missing children who have survived, and to prevent more families from being destroyed.”

    More than 14,000 children have been killed by Israeli forces in the Gaza Strip since October 7, and many others have experienced devastating psychological and physical trauma, including the loss of limbs. Dozens of children have also been starved to death in recent months as Israel’s blockade hinders the flow of lifesaving humanitarian assistance.

    Conditions for children have further deteriorated since Israel’s invasion of Rafah, which has forced roughly a million people to flee the city. Last month, Israeli forces used U.S.-made bombs in an attack on a Rafah camp sheltering displaced people, killing dozens—including women and children. The United Nations Human Rights Office said that infants were “torn apart” in the attack and people were “trapped inside burning plastic tents, leading to a horrific casualty toll.”

    Save the Children stressed Monday that its count of Gaza’s missing kids is far from conclusive, given the difficulty of collecting accurate information in areas under near-constant attack. The group noted that “confirming identification of a body by the next of kin is almost impossible when whole families have been wiped out and entry restrictions mean the equipment and experts needed cannot get in.”

    Jeremy Stoner, Save the Children’s regional director for the Middle East, said that “families are tortured by the uncertainty of the whereabouts of their loved ones.”

    “No parent should have to dig through rubble or mass graves to try and find their child’s body. No child should be alone, unprotected in a war zone. No child should be detained or held hostage,” said Stoner. “Children who are missing but living are vulnerable, face grave protection risks, and must be found. They must be protected and reunited with their families. For the children who have been killed, their deaths must be formally marked, their families informed, burial rites respected, and accountability sought.”

    “As many have pointed out, Gaza has become a graveyard for children, with thousands of others missing, their fates unknown,” he added. “There must be an independent investigation and those responsible must be held accountable. We desperately need a cease-fire to find and support the missing children who have survived, and to prevent more families from being destroyed.”

    Original article by JAKE JOHNSON republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

    Zionist Keir Starmes is quoted "I support Zionism without qualification." He's asked whether that means that he supports Zionism under all circumstances, whatever Zionists do.
    Zionist Keir Starmes is quoted “I support Zionism without qualification.” He’s asked whether that means that he supports Zionism under all circumstances, whatever Zionists do.

  • Oxfam Says Israel ‘Actively Hindering’ Aid to Gaza in Violation of ICJ Order

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    Original article by JAKE JOHNSON republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

    Palestinian children in Rafah, Gaza gather to receive food distributed by aid organizations on March 15, 2024.  (Photo: Jehad Alshrafi/Anadolu via Getty Images)

    “There is an indisputable, man-made, intentional deprivation of aid that continues to suck the life out of any and all humanitarian operations, including our own,” said one campaigner.

    The Israeli government is intentionally restricting the flow of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip by subjecting shipments to a prolonged and dysfunctional inspection process, arbitrarily rejecting items, attacking aid convoys, and limiting the number of crossings through which deliveries can pass, Oxfam International said in a report published late Sunday.

    The report, titled Inflicting Unprecedented Suffering and Destruction, argues that Israel’s continued obstruction of humanitarian aid is a direct violation of both international humanitarian law (IHL) and a January order from the International Court of Justice (ICJ), which ruled the Israeli government is “plausibly” committing genocide in Gaza and must ensure that assistance reaches desperate Gazans.

    Oxfam said Sunday that “humanitarian access in the Gaza Strip has effectively worsened” since the ICJ handed down its interim order nearly two months ago, and conditions on the ground in the Palestinian territory have deteriorated rapidly. New data from the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) shows that Gaza’s “entire population” is facing “high levels of acute food insecurity” and 1.1 million people are experiencing “catastrophic” hunger—a figure that one expert called “unprecedented.”

    “The ICJ order should have shocked Israeli leaders to change course, but since then conditions in Gaza have actually worsened,” said Sally Abi Khalil, Oxfam’s Middle East and North Africa director. “The fact that other governments have not challenged Israel hard enough, but instead turned to less effective methods like airdrops and maritime corridors is a huge red flag, signaling that Israel continues to deny the full potential of better ways to deliver more aid.”

    “Israeli authorities are not only failing to facilitate the international aid effort but are actively hindering it,” Abi Khalil added. “We believe that Israel is failing to take all measures within its power to prevent genocide.”

    In its new report, Oxfam outlines seven ways in which the Israeli government is impeding humanitarian aid shipments and exacerbating one of the worst humanitarian catastrophes in modern history:

    In February—the first full month after the ICJ’s order—Israel allowed just 2,874 aid trucks to enter the Gaza Strip, a 44% decline compared to the previous month, according to Oxfam.

    The group said Israeli authorities “have rejected a warehouse full of international aid including oxygen, incubators, and Oxfam water and sanitation gear, all of which is now stockpiled at Al Arish just 40 kilometers away from the border of 2.3 million desperate Palestinians in Gaza.”

    Israel’s military, which is armed by the U.S. and other major countries that are legally obligated to prevent genocide, has also blocked humanitarian staff from entering Gaza, adding “pressure and workload” to already overwhelmed aid efforts, Oxfam said.

    Celine Maayeh, advocacy and research officer at Juzoor for Health and Social Development—an Oxfam partner organization—said Sunday that “there’s been an alarming increase in cases of malnutrition among children in the last month, and yet the only food the team is able to find to feed people living in 45 shelters is some vegetables.”

    “There is an indisputable, man-made, intentional deprivation of aid that continues to suck the life out of any and all humanitarian operations, including our own,” said Maayeh.

    “If a famine is declared, it will already be too late for too many people—children are famine’s first victims and are already dying in Gaza because of malnutrition.”

    Oxfam’s findings are consistent with those of other aid organizations and lawmakers who have visited the region in recent weeks.

    In January, U.S. Sens. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) and Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) told reporters that they witnessed “miles of backed-up trucks” stuck at border crossings as Gazans nearby struggled to survive, eating grass and drinking contaminated water.

    The senators said they saw one warehouse full of items that Israeli authorities rejected in their inspection process, including oxygen cylinders and medical kits used for delivering babies.

    Van Hollen said the warehouse was “a testament to the arbitrariness” of Israel’s inspections.

    Oxfam argued Sunday that the “only meaningful solution” to Gaza’s intensifying humanitarian emergency is “an immediate, permanent, and unconditional cease-fire.”

    “Even the trickle of aid that a humanitarian response could provide under the current circumstances is being further obstructed by Israel’s policies and practices, inflicting suffering on millions of Palestinians who are living under Israeli bombardment without access to food, clean water, and medical care,” the group said.

    Xavier Joubert, country director for Save the Children in the occupied Palestinian territory, echoed Oxfam’s call for a cease-fire and warned in response to the new IPC figures that “we have a clear timeframe to stave off famine, and it demands urgency.”

    “If a famine is declared, it will already be too late for too many people—children are famine’s first victims and are already dying in Gaza because of malnutrition,” said Joubert. “Every minute counts for them. It should be on the collective conscience of Israeli authorities and the international community that every day without an immediate, definitive cease-fire and unfettered access for and to humanitarian aid is another catastrophic day of starvation and suffering, another step towards famine, and another death knell for Gaza’s children.”

    Original article by JAKE JOHNSON republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

  • Starving Children in Gaza ‘Cannot Wait’ Weeks for US Port, Aid Groups Say

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    Original article by JAKE JOHNSON republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

    Palestinian children are pictured near makeshift tents in Deir al-Balah, Gaza on March 7, 2024.  (Photo: Majdi Fathi/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

    “They are already dying from malnutrition and saving their lives is a matter of hours or days,” said Jason Lee of Save the Children.

    Leading humanitarian groups said Friday that starving people in Gaza, including more than a million children, are in need of immediate aid and can’t afford to wait for the U.S. military to construct a port on the enclave’s coast, a project that’s expected to take weeks.

    “Children in Gaza cannot wait to eat,” said Jason Lee, country director for Save the Children in the occupied Palestinian territory. “They are already dying from malnutrition and saving their lives is a matter of hours or days—not weeks.”

    At least 17 children have starved to death in Gaza, according to Defense for Children International – Palestine, and many more are currently struggling to survive.

    Condemning Israel’s obstruction of ground-based aid deliveries as “a grave violation against children” and international law, Lee stressed Friday that “there is already a tried and tested system in place to effectively coordinate aid.”

    “But trucks of food and medicines that could save lives are waiting at crossings, while children are starving just miles away,” Lee continued. “Airdrops, with no on-the-ground coordination of who it reaches, and maritime corridors like the one announced yesterday, are no solutions to keep children alive. Neither are substitutes for unimpeded humanitarian assistance via the established land routes.”

    U.S. President Joe Biden announced during his State of the Union address Thursday night that he has directed the nation’s military to “lead an emergency mission to establish a temporary pier in the Mediterranean on the coast of Gaza that can receive large shipments carrying food, water, medicine, and temporary shelters.”

    The president also said Israel, whose military is armed to the teeth with U.S. weaponry, “must do its part” by allowing “more aid into Gaza”—but did not threaten any consequences if the Netanyahu government refuses.

    “Israel needs to facilitate rather than block the flow of supplies. This is not a logistics problem; it is a political problem.”

    Ground deliveries into Gaza have plummeted in recent weeks as Israeli forces have attacked aid convoys and prevented trucks from entering and moving through the territory. A World Food Program (WFP) official said earlier this week there’s enough food to feed Gaza’s “entire population” sitting just outside of the strip.

    “We need land crossings, we need access to get it into Gaza, whether in the southern parts of Gaza or the northern part of Gaza because the situation is catastrophic. So having access is really our number one priority,” said Samer AbdelJaber, WFP’s director of emergency.

    The WFP has said aid airdrops—which Biden authorized last week—are a “last resort” and “will not avert famine.” On Friday, aid packages dropped into Gaza by U.S. military planes killed five people and injured at least 10 others.

    Avril Benoît, executive director for Doctors Without Borders, argued Friday that Biden’s plan for a temporary port “is a glaring distraction from the real problem: Israel’s indiscriminate and disproportionate military campaign and punishing siege.”

    “The food, water, and medical supplies so desperately needed by people in Gaza are sitting just across the border,” said Benoît. “Israel needs to facilitate rather than block the flow of supplies. This is not a logistics problem; it is a political problem. Rather than look to the U.S. military to build a workaround, the U.S. should insist on immediate humanitarian access using the roads and entry points that already exist.”

    Refugees International said in a report released Thursday that its research teams found Israel is engaged in “routine and arbitrary denial of legitimate humanitarian goods from entering Gaza,” forcing aid convoys to undergo “a highly complicated” inspection process “without clear or consistent instructions.”

    “Our research makes clear that conditions inside of Gaza are apocalyptic,” the group said. “After five months of war, Palestinians are struggling to find adequate food, water, shelter, and basic medicine. Famine-level hunger is already widespread and worsening.”

    Matt Duss, executive vice president of the Center for International Policy and a former foreign policy adviser to U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), wrote Friday that while “more aid for Palestinians on the brink of starvation is obviously good,” the Biden administration’s airdrops and plan for a temporary port underscore “the incoherence of U.S. policy right now, in which we’re trying to ease Palestinian suffering while continuing to unconditionally arm and support the government that is intentionally inflicting that suffering.”

    “The president seems to recognize that ultimately this conflict will require a political solution, but is still unwilling to bring the full weight of America’s considerable leverage to that goal,” wrote Duss.

    Original article by JAKE JOHNSON republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

  • UK won’t say when or if it will restart aid to Gaza despite reports of famine

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    Original article by Adam Ramsay republished from OpenDemocracy under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International licence.

    RAFAH, GAZA – JANUARY 04: UNRWA personnel distribute flour to Palestinian families  | (Photo by Abed Zagout/Anadolu via Getty Images)

    Aid is suspended amid allegations about UNRWA. There is no such suspension of arms exports despite evidence of genocide

    The UK government still has no answers about if or when it will restart funding to the main relief agency in Gaza despite mounting reports of famine.

    Britain’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) said last month it was stopping aid to UNRWA while it “reviewed” allegations from the Israeli government that 12 of the agency’s 13,000 staff had been involved in attacks on Israel in October.

    No such suspension has been announced of Britain’s arms exports to Israel, despite the International Court of Justice having found there was a plausible case that Israel was committing genocide in Gaza. The ICJ also ordered Israel to allow aid into the region.

    The Israeli government’s allegations came in the form of a six-page dossier, which Israel passed to UNRWA and its donors the day after the genocide ruling. In recent years, claims made by the Israeli government have repeatedly been subsequently dismissed as propaganda intended to influence geopolitics at key moments.

    Labour MP Zarah Sultana has submitted a parliamentary question asking the department what the review involves and how long it will take given the urgent humanitarian crisis in the region more than two weeks on, but it has snubbed both her and openDemocracy’s questions.

    While the dossier that Israel passed to UNRWA and its donors was confidential, Channel 4 News managed to get a copy, and said it provided no evidence for the explosive claims, which knocked the genocide ruling off front pages across the western world.

    UNRWA, whose full name is the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, was founded in 1949 to support the hundreds of thousands of Palestinian refugees forced from their homes in order to create the state of Israel in 1948.

    It currently supports 5.9 million Palestinian refugees, including those in Gaza and the West Bank affected by the current conflict, in Lebanon where there is ongoing socio-economic collapse, in Syria, where the civil war continues, and in Jordan. With its projects including running schools, medical clinics and hospitals and the distribution of food aid, it is the biggest single UN agency.

    Before the allegations were made, senior Israeli officials had argued that it would be necessary to destroy UNRWA in order to win the war on Gaza.

    Sultana called the government’s suspension of UNRWA funding “an act of collective punishment on the Palestinian people, millions of whom are currently displaced, unable to access food and water, and in urgent need of humanitarian aid”.

    She said it was right that the allegations against UNRWA staff were investigated, but added that it was Britain’s duty under international law to ensure Palestinians in Gaza have access to humanitarian assistance. “The government’s refusal to be transparent about this decision and the process for its investigation is wholly unacceptable,” she said.

    The UK’s contributions to UNRWA have varied over the years, peaking at around £90m in 2019 before being slashed to around £25m in 2022. UNRWA has subsequently admitted it fired all the staff members accused by Israel of involvement in the attacks before investigating whether there was any truth to the allegations.

    The UN Secretary General has called for the donors who have suspended their funding “to, at least, guarantee the continuity of UNRWA’s operations”. UNRWA has said that the decision of some donors to suspend funding “threatens our ongoing humanitarian work across the region”. While some governments, like the UK, have suspended aid, others including Belgium, Ireland, Denmark and Spain have continued their funding.

    The UK government has said that it remains “committed to getting humanitarian aid to the people in Gaza who desperately need it,” but other aid organisations who operate in Gaza have argued that none but UNRWA has the capacity to deliver it. More than 20 aid groups, including Oxfam and Save the Children, have warned that, if funding suspensions are not reversed, “we may see a complete collapse of the already restricted humanitarian response in Gaza”, calling the government’s decision “reckless”.

    The UK says it “allocated” £16m to UNRWA between 7 October and the suspension in January, and that no further UK funding was due until April 2024. It has not said how much of the £16m has already been paid or spent, and how much is affected by the decision to suspend payments.

    The BBC reported yesterday that children in northern Gaza have been going for days without food as aid can no longer reach them.

    Original article by Adam Ramsay republished from OpenDemocracy under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International licence.

    Image of UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. UK halts aid to UNRWA in Gaza over Israeli allegations that 12 staff from a total of 13,000 were involved in the 7 October 2024 attack on Israel.
    Image of UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. UK halts aid to UNRWA in Gaza over Israeli allegations that 12 staff from a total of 13,000 were involved in the 7 October 2024 attack on Israel.
    Zionist Keir Starmer supports Israel's Gaza genocide.
    Zionist Keir Starmer supports Israel’s Gaza genocide.

  • Human rights organisations demand weapons embargo to stop fuelling Gaza crisis

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    https://leftfootforward.org/2024/01/human-rights-organisations-demand-weapons-embargo-to-stop-fuelling-gaza-crisis/

    ‘All states have an obligation to prevent atrocity crimes and promote adherence to norms that protect civilians. The international community is long overdue to live up to these commitments.’

    Sixteen leading international human rights and humanitarian organisations have made a joint call to all UN Member States to stop fuelling the crisis in Gaza, to avert further loss of civilian life and humanitarian catastrophe.

    The aid coalition includes Oxfam, Amnesty International, and Save the Children. It is demanding an immediate halt on the transfer of weapons, parts and ammunition to Israel and Palestinian armed groups while there is a risk they are used to ‘commit or facilitate serious violations of international humanitarian or human rights law.’

    The United Nations’ Palestinian Refugee Agency has warned that around 1.7 million people have been displaced within Gaza. The Gaza Health Ministry says the Palestinian death toll from the conflict is over 25,700, most of which are women and children. Islamic Relief (IR) said the figures show that 4 percent of the population of Gaza was now dead or injured.

    Over 95 percent of Israel’s supply of weapons comes from the US. The UK, Italy and Germany also produce parts which are sold to Israel. The UK is home to Israeli weapon manufacturers, including Elbit Systems, which makes surveillance and armed drones. Both the UK and US administrations have been accused of playing a part in facilitating the destruction of Gaza.

    …

    https://leftfootforward.org/2024/01/human-rights-organisations-demand-weapons-embargo-to-stop-fuelling-gaza-crisis/