Abdullah Abu Deif, Shaaban Bilal (Rafah, Cairo)
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) announced that 133 of its employees have died in the Gaza Strip since the outbreak of war on October 7, indicating that the situation in the Strip is going from bad to worse and that there are no safe places in the Strip.
UNRWA spokesman Kazem Abu Khalaf said in a statement to Al-Ittihad that the situation in the Gaza Strip is going from bad to worse with the decline in relief provision from specialized agencies due to their lack of availability and the interruption of communications service, in addition to the limited amount of aid entering the Gaza Strip, which increases The scale of the humanitarian crisis. He added that there are no safe places inside the Strip or safe corridors for humanitarian workers that allow providing aid to civilians, as the destruction has affected all parts of the besieged Strip, reaching the destruction of 60% of homes.
He added that UNRWA evacuated 4 of its shelters in Khan Yunis, south of the Gaza Strip, last Wednesday, following orders from the Israeli authorities to evacuate.
He explained that 1.9 million people, or more than 85% of the Gaza Strip’s population, have been displaced within the Gaza Strip since the outbreak of the war, noting that among them are those who have been displaced multiple times, warning that “families are exposed to severe dangers at a time when they are forced to move and move again in search of Safety”.
He stated that about 1.2 million displaced people reside in 151 facilities affiliated with the agency in all five governorates of the Gaza Strip, noting that more than one million displaced people are in 94 facilities in the central, Khan Yunis and Rafah regions.
Kazem Abu Khalaf warned that “the Gaza Strip is heading towards the largest tragedy and humanitarian disaster during the coming period, and this is inevitable, and then the agency will announce at that time that it is unable to provide humanitarian aid to the residents of the Strip, as aid is already being distributed during the current period in a limited and partial manner in the Rafah area according to data. The field and the actions of war.
In a related context, the Director of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, considered reports of the siege of Al Awda Hospital in the northern Gaza Strip “extremely worrying.” He said in a blog post on the “X” platform: “Reports about the siege of Al-Awda Hospital, which operates on a limited basis in northern Gaza, raise great concern.”
Ghebreyesus stressed the need to protect patients and health care workers who are still inside the hospital, calling for an immediate ceasefire.
In another blog post, he said, “There is no safe place in Gaza. We are very concerned about thousands of patients and health and care workers, and the only way to protect them is a ceasefire, now.” Ghebreyesus pointed out that the violent clashes make it difficult to conduct any health operations.
The Jordanian political analyst, Dr. Amer Al-Sabaila, stressed the necessity of searching now for a stronger agreement formula to reach a permanent truce, explaining that Israel’s inability to reach a decisive point of confrontation with the Palestinians during the days of war represents a loss for it, which will raise the ceiling of its requests significantly until it agrees to a permanent truce. .
Al-Sabaila expected, in a statement to Al-Ittihad, that a new reality would be imposed in Gaza in the event of a permanent ceasefire agreement being reached, whether at the level of geographical location, the form of civil administration in Gaza, or other issues related to Gaza in the future.
Dr. Tayseer Abu Juma, professor of political science at Palestine University, described the field situation in the Gaza Strip as “very difficult,” especially in the city of Khan Yunis, stressing that the political situation is frozen after the Israeli side withdrew from the truce negotiations in Doha.
Abu Jumaa pointed out, in a statement to Al-Ittihad, that there are Egyptian-Qatari-American contacts to reach a ceasefire and reach a new truce, adding that Israel is seeking to accelerate the release of the remaining hostages and waive the conditions for negotiating the military hostages.
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