‘This must stop,’ UN chief says as deaths, displacement ripple across Gaza

Spikes in casualties, attacks on schools and shelters, including the death of a UN worker, and crippling fuel shortages blocking aid deliveries rippled across Gaza over the weekend, as the World Health Organization (WHO) helped to evacuate 31 babies in critical condition at the besieged Al-Shifa Hospital and the UN chief called for a humanitarian ceasefire amid the ongoing Israel-Palestine crisis.

Top UN officials echoed that call to improve conditions for Gaza’s 2.3 million people, 1.7 million of which have been displaced since the 7 October Hamas attack in Israel.

“This war is having a staggering and unacceptable number of civilian casualties, including women and children, every day,” UN Secretary-General António Guterres said in a statement on Sunday. “This must stop. I reiterate my call for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire.”

Volker Türk, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), said in a statement on Sunday that: “The horrendous events of the past 48 hours in Gaza beggar belief.”

Growing despair

“The killing of so many people at schools turned shelters, hundreds fleeing for their lives from Al-Shifa Hospital amid continuing displacement of hundreds of thousands in southern Gaza are actions which fly in the face of the basic protections civilians must be afforded under international law,” Mr Türk said, stressing that failing to adhere to these rules may constitute war crimes.

According to the UN Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which issued its latest situation report on Sunday, nearly 884,000 internally displaced persons are sheltering in 154 UNRWA installations across all five governorates of the Gaza Strip.

Smoke billows following an Israeli strike on Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on 20 November 2023, amid continuing battles between Israel and Hamas. (Photo by Mahmud HAMS / AFP)

“Just getting into one of the shelters makes you burst into tears,” a UNRWA employee said. “Children looking for food and water and standing in queues for over six hours just to get a piece of bread or a bottle of water. People are literally sleeping on streets here in Khan Younis as thousands keep escaping from the north.”

Attacks on schools, shelters

In less than 24 hours, two UNRWA schools sheltering displaced families were hit, causing “many deaths” and injuries, mostly of women and children, in addition to other deadly incidents across Gaza and the West Bank against the backdrop of soaring humanitarian needs, UNRWA said.

Mr Türk said at least three other schools hosting displaced Palestinians have also been attacked.

“This must stop,” he said. “Humanity must come first. A ceasefire – on humanitarian and human rights grounds – is desperately needed. Now.”

Philippe Lazzarini, who heads UNRWA, said in a statement on Sunday that the attacks are “just cruel”.

“I watched with sheer horror reports from an attack on the Al-Fakhoura UNRWA school-turned-shelter in northern Gaza,” he said.

Classrooms sheltering displaced families were hit and at least 24 people were reported killed in the strike. Up to 7,000 people were in the school at the time, the UNRWA chief said. On Friday, following strikes on the UNRWA Al-Falah/Zeitoun school in Gaza City, ambulances could not reach the school, where 4,000 people were sheltering.

Beyond ‘collateral damage’

Since 7 October, at least 176 people sheltering in the agency’s schools were reported killed and 800 wounded during Israeli bombardments, Mr. Lazzarini said.

“A large number of UNRWA facilities hit and the number of civilians killed cannot just be ‘collateral damage’,” he said, adding that the UN agency routinely shares the buildings’ coordinates with parties to the conflict.

“This vicious war is reaching a point of no return when all rules are disrespected, in overt disregard for civilian lives,” he said, calling and appealing “once again for humanity to prevail and for a humanitarian ceasefire right now."