Frankly Speaking: What hope is there for Gaza’s children?

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Updated 01 April 2024
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Frankly Speaking: What hope is there for Gaza’s children?

  • UNICEF’s spokesperson says averting famine in Gaza hinges on immediate ceasefire and unrestricted aid access
  • James Elder calls UNRWA the ‘backbone’ of humanitarian aid in Gaza and no other agency can take its place
  • Says Gaza is “potentially the most dangerous place in the world” for aid workers and recipients

DUBAI: Is there any hope for the children of Gaza amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas conflict, restrictions on aid access, and a looming famine in the north of the enclave?

According to UN Children’s Fund spokesperson James Elder, who recently toured the length of Gaza, only an immediate ceasefire can turn the humanitarian situation around.

Appearing on the Arab News current affairs show “Frankly Speaking” via video link from Rafah, on the Gaza-Egypt border, Elder said that opening multiple entry points and delivering sufficient aid could help save the most vulnerable, including the one in three children under the age of two in the north of Gaza who are suffering from acute malnutrition.




Speaking to “Frankly Speaking” host Katie Jensen from Rafah, James Elder lauded the irreplaceable role played in the humanitarian response by UNRWA and highlighted Israel’s unmet obligations under international law to allow sufficient aid to enter Gaza. (AN photo)

“The ability to scale out, to get aid across an area, is what UNICEF does,” Elder told “Frankly Speaking” host Katie Jensen.

“We have the world’s largest humanitarian supply hub in Denmark. We airlift, we ship, we do everything. We have warehouses here in the region as well. So, multiple warehouses … consistently ready to bring in that aid.”

However, until Israel lifts its restrictions on how much aid is permitted to enter the embattled enclave, enabling UNICEF and other humanitarian agencies to deliver much-needed relief, many fear the extreme food insecurity already endured by Palestinians will escalate into a full-blown famine.

In the wide-ranging interview, Elder described the irreplaceable role played in the humanitarian response by the cash-strapped UN Relief and Works Agency, UNRWA, and highlighted Israel’s unmet obligations under international law to allow sufficient aid to enter Gaza.




Speaking to “Frankly Speaking” host Katie Jensen from Rafah, James Elder lauded the irreplaceable role played in the humanitarian response by UNRWA and highlighted Israel’s unmet obligations under international law to allow sufficient aid to enter Gaza. (AN photo)

Elder also spoke about the “annihilation” of Gazan cities and the threats posed to UN workers and aid recipients amid the fighting, which had made the Palestinian territory “potentially the most dangerous place on the planet.”

A UN-backed report released in March warned that unless the hostilities are halted and unrestricted aid is allowed to flow into the Gaza Strip, famine could occur by the end of May. The report said 70 percent of Gaza’s 2.3 million-strong population is experiencing catastrophic levels of hunger and food insecurity.

The International Court of Justice at The Hague warned on Thursday that “famine is setting in” as a result of Israel’s continued restrictions on the flow of aid.

In a unanimous ruling, the UN’s highest court ordered Israel to take “all the necessary and effective action” to ensure basic food supplies reach the Palestinian people without delay.

And while saving people in Gaza from starvation is achievable, it will take longer to address “things like disease, the devastation to the health system, to hospitals, to water systems, to sewerage,” said Elder.

Since Israel launched its Gaza operation in retaliation for the Hamas-led attack of October 7, the enclave has become a graveyard for at least 13,000 children, according to UN figures.

Acute malnutrition now affects 31 percent of children under the age of two in the northern governorates, while at least 23 children have already died of starvation and dehydration.

Creating these conditions could amount to a war crime, the UN human rights chief, Volker Turk, told the BBC on Thursday, adding that there was a “plausible” case that Israel was using starvation as a weapon of war in Gaza.

“International humanitarian law is very clear on proportionalities and on what warring factions can do,” said Elder. “We have seen so many breaches in this war, and for children it seems to make no difference right now. Children don’t understand whether international law is being abided by or not.

“Right now, all they are doing is facing the severity of something that no child ever, ever should have to endure.”

In the initial months of the conflict, the bulk of aid distribution and relief work was carried out by UNRWA, which has supported Palestinian refugees in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon since 1949.




UN workers prepare humanitarian food aid at a UNRWA warehouse/distribution center in Rafah for distribution to Palestinian refugees amid continuing battles between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas. The warehouse was partially hit by an Israeli strike on March 13, 2024. (AFP)

However, in January, more than a dozen countries suspended funding for UNRWA after Israel claimed that 12 of the UN agency’s staff had participated in the October 7 attack, while 450 others were “military operatives in terror groups.”

Although an internal investigation and a separate independent investigation have been launched to examine the allegations, the bulk of UNRWA’s funding is still yet to be restored, bringing its operations in Gaza to the brink of collapse.

Elder said UNICEF and other aid agencies are in no position to assume UNRWA’s responsibilities if it goes under.

“UNRWA is the backbone of humanitarian aid in the Gaza Strip,” he said. “UNRWA has got thousands and thousands of very brave workers, of teachers, of doctors, of pharmacists, of nurses, of you name it.

“UNICEF has deep specialties in child protection and nutrition and so forth, but in terms of that full manpower across the Gaza Strip, the people of Gaza need UNRWA.”

He added: “Fifty percent of food aid getting to those civilians in the north was delivered by UNRWA. That has now been blocked. That’s fast-tracking catastrophe.”




Israeli demonstrators gather by the border fence with Egypt at the Nitzana border crossing in southern Israel on February 18, 2024, as they attempt to block humanitarian aid trucks from entering into Israel on their way to the Gaza Strip. (AFP)

Gaza has become an extremely dangerous place for aid agencies to operate.

“People have been killed receiving aid, aid workers — more aid workers, more of my United Nations colleagues killed in this war than in any time since the advent of the United Nations. This is the reality that people are dealing with,” said Elder.

“Now the UN does work in very dangerous places. That’s what we do. Afghanistan, Sudan, Ukraine, here in Gaza. But we need to be very clear. International humanitarian law is unequivocal. Israel has a legal obligation to facilitate aid, not just getting in, but then to ensure it is safely distributed to those most in need.”

During his journey along the length of the Gaza Strip, Elder was appalled by the scale of the humanitarian catastrophe. While traveling through the Rafah border crossing from Egypt, he saw “hundreds of trucks blocked there with life-saving aid on the wrong side of the border.”

“We are not getting nearly enough aid in,” he added.

Later, during his visit to northern Gaza, he saw “people hanging on to life, children and families who urgently need food.” And yet, “there are crossings there that could be opened, old crossings where you would have aid within 10 or 15 minutes.”

With road access into Gaza limited by Israeli forces, aid agencies have been examining options for a maritime corridor. In mid-March, the Open Arms set sail from Cyprus towing 200 tonnes of flour, protein, and rice bound for Gaza.




The Open Arms, a rescue vessel owned by a Spanish NGO, departs with humanitarian aid for Gaza from Larnaca, Cyprus, on March 30, 2024. (REUTERS)

“Any aid is useful aid, but the ship had the equivalent of around 12 trucks,” said Elder. “There’s 50 times 12 trucks on the other side of the border.”

Another aid access workaround pursued by the US, Jordan and Egypt is airdrops, parachuting aid into Gaza.

However, airdrops are usually used “when people are massively cut off from humanitarian assistance — a flood or a natural disaster,” said Elder. “Here, they’re not cut off. There’s a road network. Road is the efficient, effective way. Roads are what will turn around this humanitarian catastrophe with a ceasefire.”




Jordan, along with the US, German and other European countries had been delivering food aid to Gaza by parachutes, but the scale of starvation in the Israeli-besieged enclave is barely enough, according to humanitarian agencies. (AFP)

Echoing criticism of Israel’s limits on the flow of aid, Elder said: “We need to be very clear. International humanitarian law is unequivocal. Israel has a legal obligation to facilitate aid, not just getting in, but then to ensure it is safely distributed to those most in need.”

On March 25, the UN Security Council passed a resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza for the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, which ends in less than a fortnight.

Elder said the resolution must be “substantive and not symbolic” because a ceasefire “allows the United Nations to flood the Gaza Strip with humanitarian aid and we can turn this imminent famine around.”




A United Nations vehicle drives by as Palestinian girls share a food ration in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on March 31, 2024. (AFP)

A ceasefire, said Elder, would also allow Israel to bring home its citizens who have been held hostage in Gaza since October 7. “There are children here somewhere underground or whatever horrendous torment they are enduring,” he said. “End the torment, get hostages home.”

He added: “A ceasefire means families — a mother and a child can go to bed with absolute certainty that they will wake up. They haven’t had that for many months.”
In November and December last year, Elder said he visited Al-Nasr Hospital in Khan Younis, where the “incredible” health workers were “doing 24-36-hour shifts in a war zone.”

“They were doing the work that they knew they love to do, and they were born to do as some had said, but they were terrified because their families were outside.”




Palestinians inspect the site of an Israeli strike on a house in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip on March 29, 2024. (REUTERS)

Returning to Khan Younis in recent days, Elder said: “I went through it now and it’s just annihilated, street after street, rubble everywhere. I have not seen that level of devastation, which in my mind segued to here, to Rafah, and why we cannot see that happen here.”

Now, it is as though Khan Younis and Gaza City no longer exist. “Just cracked rubble and steel as far as you can see and stunned looking people, because home after home has been destroyed,” he said.

Rafah, meanwhile, “is a city of tents. It’s a city of children. This is where families were meant to go to stay safe. And there’s a desperation here, but there is a solidarity. People do what they can for each other.”

He added: “I’ve been across the Gaza Strip. In the north is a level of suffering that I can’t say defies words, but it is getting to a point where, well, we’re seeing children die of malnutrition, of dehydration.”




A mourner carries the body of a Palestinian child killed in an Israeli strike in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip on March 29, 2024. (REUTERS)

“You see parents in tears over a child’s cot, a child who is paper thin. This is a mother who’s done everything she can to protect her child from these relentless … bombardments. And now she’s trying to protect her child from starvation.

“These mothers and fathers are learning that the real decisions about the safety of their children are being made by people elsewhere. So, there is a level of stress and anxiety across the Gaza Strip.”

Elder said the situation in Gaza “speaks to the mental trauma here of more than a million children.

“As a child psychologist said to me, we are in uncharted territory here when it comes to the mental health of girls and boys in Gaza.”
 

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Israeli strikes batter Lebanon, killing five medics

Updated 22 November 2024
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Israeli strikes batter Lebanon, killing five medics

  • Israel has pushed on with its intense military campaign against Hezbollah, tempering hopes that efforts by a US envoy could lead to an imminent ceasefire
  • Hezbollah said it had fired rockets at Israeli troops east of Khiyam at least four times on Friday

BEIRUT: Israeli strikes battered southern Lebanon and the outskirts of the capital Beirut on Friday, killing at least five medics, as ground troops clashed with Hezbollah fighters in the south.
Israel has pushed on with its intense military campaign against the Iran-backed armed group Hezbollah, tempering hopes that efforts by a US envoy could lead to an imminent ceasefire.
US mediator Amos Hochstein said earlier this week in Beirut that a truce was “within our grasp.” He traveled on to meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz before returning to Washington, according to the news outlet Axios.
His trip aimed to end more than a year of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah along Lebanon’s southern border, which escalated dramatically when Israel ramped up its strikes in late September and sent ground troops into Lebanon on Oct. 1.
Israeli troops have fought Hezbollah in a strip of towns all along the border and this week pushed deeper to the edges of Khiyam, a town some six km (four miles) from the border. Hezbollah said it had fired rockets at Israeli troops east of Khiyam at least four times on Friday.
Lebanese security sources told Reuters that Israeli troops had also advanced in a string of villages to the west as well. They said Israel was most likely trying to isolate Khiyam ahead of a major attack on the town.
Israeli strikes on two other villages in southern Lebanon killed a total of five medics from a rescue force affiliated with Hezbollah, the Lebanese health ministry said.
The more than 3,500 people killed by Israeli strikes over the last year include more than 200 medics, the health ministry said.
Israel says its aim is to secure the return home of tens of thousands of people evacuated from Israel’s north due to rocket attacks by Hezbollah, which began firing across the border in support of Hamas at the start of the Gaza war in October 2023.
Israel also mounted more strikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs, a once densely populated stronghold of Hezbollah.
It issued evacuation orders on the social media platform X for several buildings in the area on Friday. Reuters footage showed one of the strikes appearing to pierce the center of a multi-story building, sending the whole structure toppling in a massive cloud of smoke.


UN reports heavy clashes between Israeli troops and Hezbollah in south Lebanon

Updated 22 November 2024
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UN reports heavy clashes between Israeli troops and Hezbollah in south Lebanon

  • “We are aware of heavy shelling in the vicinity of our bases,” UNIFIL spokesman Andrea Tenenti said
  • Asked if the peacekeepers and staff at the headquarters are safe, Tenenti said: “Yes for the moment”

BEIRUT: Israeli troops fought fierce battles with Hezbollah fighters on Friday in different areas in south Lebanon, including a coastal town that is home to the headquarters of UN peacekeepers.
A spokesman for the UN peacekeeping force known as UNIFIL told The Associated Press that they are monitoring “heavy clashes” in the coastal town of Naqoura and the village of Chamaa to the northeast.
UNIFIL’s headquarters are located in Naqoura in Lebanon’s southern edge close to the border with Israel.
“We are aware of heavy shelling in the vicinity of our bases,” UNIFIL spokesman Andrea Tenenti said. Asked if the peacekeepers and staff at the headquarters are safe, Tenenti said: “Yes for the moment.”
Several UNIFIL posts have been hit since Israel began its ground invasion of Lebanon on Oct. 1, leaving a number of peacekeepers wounded.
The fighting came a day after the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his former defense minister and a Hamas military leader, accusing them of war crimes and crimes against humanity over their 13-month war in Gaza and the October 2023 attack on Israel respectively.
The warrant marked the first time that a sitting leader of a major Western ally has been accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity by a global court of justice.
Israel’s war has caused heavy destruction across Gaza, decimated parts of the territory and driven almost the entire population of 2.3 million people from their homes, leaving most dependent on aid to survive.
Israel launched its war in Gaza after Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting another 250. Around 100 hostages are still inside Gaza, at least a third of whom are believed to be dead.
Israel has also launched airstrikes against Lebanon after the Hezbollah militant group began firing rockets, drones and missiles into Israel the day after Hamas’ attack last October. A full-blown war erupted in September after nearly a year of lower-level conflict.


Gaza ministry: hospitals to cut or stop services ‘within 48 hours’ over fuel shortages

Updated 22 November 2024
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Gaza ministry: hospitals to cut or stop services ‘within 48 hours’ over fuel shortages

  • All hospitals in Gaza would have to stop or reduce services “within 48 hours“

GAZA: The Hamas government’s health ministry warned Friday all hospitals in Gaza would have to stop or reduce services “within 48 hours” for lack of fuel, blaming Israel for blocking its entry.
“We raise an urgent warning as all hospitals in Gaza Strip will stop working or reduce their services within 48 hours due to the occupation’s (Israel’s) obstruction of fuel entry,” Marwan Al-Hams, director of Gaza’s field hospitals, said during a press conference.


Israel says to end ‘administrative detention’ for West Bank settlers

Updated 22 November 2024
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Israel says to end ‘administrative detention’ for West Bank settlers

  • Practice allows for detainees to be held for long periods without being charged or appear in court
  • The Palestinian Prisoners Club advocacy group said in August that 3,432 Palestinians were held in administrative detention

JERUSALEM: Israeli authorities will stop holding Jewish settlers in the occupied West Bank under administrative detention, or incarceration without trial, the defense ministry announced Friday.
The practice allows for detainees to be held for long periods without being charged or appear in court, and is often used against Palestinians who Israel deems security threats.
Defense Minister Israel Katz said it was “inappropriate” for Israel to employ administrative detention against settlers who “face severe Palestinian terror threats and unjustified international sanctions.”
But, according to settlement watchdog Peace Now, it is one of only few effective tools that Israeli authorities to prevent settler attacks against Palestinians, which have surged in the West Bank over the past year.
Katz said in a statement issued by his office that prosecution or “other preventive measures” would be used to deal with criminal acts in the West Bank.
B’Tselem, an Israeli rights group, said authorities use administrative detention “extensively and routinely” to hold thousands of Palestinians for lengthy periods of time.
The Palestinian Prisoners Club advocacy group said in August that 3,432 Palestinians were held in administrative detention.
Israeli daily Haaretz reported on Friday that eight settlers were held under the same practice in November.
Yonatan Mizrahi, director of settlement watch for Peace Now, said that although administrative detention was mostly used in the West Bank to detain Palestinians, it was one of the few effective tools for temporarily removing the threat of settler violence through detention.
“The cancelation of administrative detention orders for settlers alone is a cynical... move that whitewashes and normalizes escalating Jewish terrorism under the cover of war,” the group said in a statement, referring to a spike in settler attacks throughout the Israel-Hamas conflict over the past 13 months.
Western governments, including Israel’s ally and military backer the United States, have recently imposed sanctions on Israeli settlers and settler organizations over ties to violence against Palestinians.
On Monday, US authorities announced sanctions against Amana, a movement that backs settlement development, and others who have “ties to violent actors in the West Bank.”
“Amana is a key part of the Israeli extremist settlement movement and maintains ties to various persons previously sanctioned by the US government and its partners for perpetrating violence in the West Bank,” the US Treasury said.
Excluding Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem, the West Bank — which Israel has occupied since 1967 — is home to three million Palestinians as well as about 490,000 Israelis living in settlements that are illegal under international law.


UK would arrest Netanyahu over ICC warrant: Senior politician 

Updated 22 November 2024
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UK would arrest Netanyahu over ICC warrant: Senior politician 

  • Emily Thornberry: Britain has ‘obligation under Rome Convention’ to arrest Israeli PM if he enters country 
  • Court: ‘Reasonable grounds to believe’ Netanyahu responsible for war crimes, crimes against humanity in Gaza

LONDON: The UK will arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he enters the country, a senior British politician has said.

The International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Netanyahu on Thursday for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity, alongside his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, pertaining to the Gaza war.

Emily Thornberry — Labour chair of the foreign affairs committee, and former shadow foreign secretary and shadow attorney general — told Sky News: “If Netanyahu comes to Britain, our obligation under the Rome Convention would be to arrest him under the warrant from the ICC.

“(It is) not really a question of should — we are required to, because we are members of the ICC.”

UK Home Secretary Yvette Cooper has refused to be drawn on whether Netanyahu would be arrested if he set foot on British soil, saying it “wouldn’t be appropriate for me to comment.”

She told Sky: “We’ve always respected the importance of international law, but in the majority of the cases that they pursue, they don’t become part of the British legal process.

“What I can say is that obviously, the UK government’s position remains that we believe the focus should be on getting a ceasefire in Gaza.”

Netanyahu’s arrest warrant is the first to be issued against the premier of a major Western ally by an international court for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity.

His office denounced the warrant as “anti-Semitic,” adding that Israel “rejects with disgust the absurd and false actions.” Israel is not an ICC member and rejects the court’s jurisdiction.

US President Joe Biden called the warrants against Netanyahu and Gallant “outrageous,” adding: “Whatever the ICC might imply, there is no equivalence — none — between Israel and Hamas.”

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said he plans to invite Netanyahu to visit Budapest, adding that the arrest warrant will “not be observed” by his government.

The Italian and French governments, however, have indicated that Netanyahu will be arrested if he visits either country.

The ICC said on Thursday it has “reasonable grounds to believe” that Netanyahu and Gallant “bear criminal responsibility” for “the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare; and the crimes against humanity of murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts.”

The court also issued a warrant for Hamas commander Mohammed Diab Ibrahim Al-Masri for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Israel says Al-Masri, believed to have been the mastermind behind the Hamas attack of Oct. 7, 2023, was killed in Gaza earlier this year.

The ICC said it issued the warrant for his arrest because of insufficient evidence to prove his death.