Not even 30 seconds had passed since the end of the truce between Israel and Hamas at seven in the morning (one less in Spanish peninsular time) this Friday when a missile began “to trace its path” in the sky of Gaza, he reported. phone from a place that did not require the south of the Palestinian territory James Elder, spokesperson for the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef). This Australian aid worker ran “immediately” to the Nasser hospital, the most important in the south of the Strip. There, the faces of “traumatized” people, who were already living in “horrendous conditions” and “wildly overcrowded,” once again showed “the return of death and fear, everyone’s worst nightmare,” said the head of Unicef. . For Elder, what is happening again in Gaza, after the brief respite of a week of truce, is “a war against children,” which is “spreading.”
The Unicef spokesperson refers to the figures from the Ministry of Health of the Palestinian enclave, which estimate that more than 6,000 minors have been massacred by the Israeli attacks in Gaza, almost half of the more than 15,000 people who have perished in the Strip since the start of the war now seven weeks ago. The data was endorsed this Thursday by the United Nations, which considers it credible. “Everyone knows those numbers now. We have reports of 6,000 children murdered. Unicef is an apolitical and impartial organization, but let’s look at those figures: those 6,000 children [muertos] They show that this war is devastating,” says Elder.
Doaa Ulyan, a 33-year-old Gazan refugee in Rafah with her husband and two children, ages 10 and 8, also considers the situation in Gaza “terrifying.” Through WhatsApp she explained how, since seven in the morning, Israel had not stopped bombing “even more than before.” Originally from Gaza City, this woman fled, like hundreds of thousands of her fellow citizens, to the south of the Palestinian enclave when Israel ordered the population to move there on October 12. About 1.7 million of the Strip’s 2.3 million inhabitants are now crowded into the southern region.
Shortly after the truce expired, the Israeli army littered the southern part of the enclave with leaflets. In them, he ordered a new transfer to the Gazans, this time in the direction of Rafah, on the border with Egypt, the city where Ulyan and his family are taking refuge. But that area was also constantly bombed as soon as the Israeli offensive resumed.
“They told us to go south and we did, and then they started bombing like crazy,” this Gazan continued. “The massacres shown in the images from Gaza are sufficient proof of the atrocities that are being committed against innocent civilians. We are waiting for the world to do something to protect us, but we no longer have hope and we can only ask God to protect us,” Ulyan said.
The Gaza Ministry of Health has raised the death toll in the Israeli bombings this Friday to at least 178. The nearly 600 wounded that the health authorities of the Strip have registered will only be able to resort to a health system that the war has brought “to its knees,” lamented the Unicef spokesperson.
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If the international community “does not act,” that will represent, Elder assured, “a green light for more children to be murdered.” The UN official finds it “disheartening that there are so many people who seem comfortable” with what is happening in Gaza. At the Nasser hospital, where he went after Israel resumed its attacks this Friday, “the children were absolutely terrified. Every single child in Gaza is going to need mental support and now they can’t get it until this war ends. 1.1 million children remain in the Strip.”
The lives of many of these Gazan minors have changed “forever,” said the Unicef spokesperson. In the Palestinian territory, according to data from the health authorities of the Strip that this humanitarian worker cited, there are “about 2,000 children with amputations, like little Sharma, one year old, who has lost her right leg and arm.”
“Those who have the power to do this must stop this. The longer it lasts [esta guerra], the deeper the scars will be. We will not be able to begin to seek healing until these atrocities end,” Elder explained. Children who two months ago perhaps “were in their rooms in front of their computers” now have to look again with fear at a sky from which “bombs are raining.”
“We have nowhere to run”
From Khan Yunis, Jalil Abu Shamaleh, 53 years old and former director of the human rights NGO Addameer, sent this newspaper several WhatsApp audios this Friday in which the incessant roar of war planes and the hum of drones could be heard. . This Gazan also claimed that the bombs had not stopped falling since seven in the morning. In Gaza, it was then four in the afternoon (one hour less in mainland Spain).
“People are terrified. They have seen too many people killed before the truce. Most Gazans do not dare to go out. You don’t know who could be the next target. Those who venture out do so because they have to cover some urgent need. [Los israelíes] “They have told us to leave, but we have nowhere to run,” he said.
My mom is telling me we are left with one option, to accept death. It doesn’t matter if we move or not, any minute now is our last. They say leave Khan Younis for Rafah then strike Rafah. We have no where to go. If we die at least we die in the house not out on the streets…
— Jehan Alfarra (@j_alfarra) December 1, 2023
The town of Khan Yunis, where Shamaleh takes refuge, is one of those that Israel has ordered to evacuate in its leaflets, but some Gazans who sought safety there no longer want to flee. “My mother tells me that we only have one option: accept death. It doesn’t matter if we move or not, at any moment it could be the last time. They say let’s leave Khan Yunis for Rafah and then they attack Rafah. We have nowhere to go. If we die, at least we will die at home, not on the street,” Gazan journalist Jehan Alfarra said in a tweet this Friday.
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