The World Health Organization’s Director-General, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, reportedly fought back tears at the World Health Assembly this week as he called on Israel to end its 80-day blockade of food, medicine and other humanitarian aid into Gaza.
“People are starving; 81 percent of Gazans are under constant displacement orders, and the hospitals are on their knees,” he said, according to a report in Health Policy Watch.
“I can feel how people in Gaza would feel. I can visualise it. I can hear the sounds.. It’s really wrong to weaponise food, to weaponise medical supplies,” said Dr Tedros, who has PTSD due to his experiences in war-torn Ethiopia as a child.
Read more here from Health Policy Watch: WHO Director General appeals to Israel to end deepening food crisis and conflict in Gaza.
Below are recent statements by UN Human Rights Office in Occupied Palestinian Territory, Médecins Sans Frontières, and the WHO, as well as other agencies.
Civilians and journalists targeted
Statement on 22 May: The UN Human Rights Office in Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) condemns the Israeli military’s continuing strikes on shelters for Palestinians in Gaza over the last week – including a fourfold increase in strikes on residential buildings.
These attacks have killed hundreds of civilians, injured scores of others, displaced thousands and indicate a disregard for the principles of distinction and proportionality required by international humanitarian law.
Of 629 Palestinians reportedly killed in the last week, at least 358 of them, including at least 148 children and women, were reportedly killed as a result of attacks targeting houses and IDP tents. Many more were injured or trapped under the rubble.
The high number of strikes on shelters, in the context of the existing destruction of infrastructure in Gaza, raises grave concerns that not all strikes were targeting military objectives.
In addition, nine Palestinian journalists were killed – making this past week one of the deadliest for journalists since 7 October 2023. They have a deep sense of duty to their work, but they, too, are displaced, tired and hungry like the rest of the population of Gaza.
However, it appears that in many instances, these journalists may have been deliberately targeted with the intention of limiting the flow of information on what is happening in Gaza and the scale of the impact that this war is having on civilians.
It is imperative that international journalists be allowed to enter Gaza and their safety ensured, in order to report freely on what is happening on the ground and to promote accountability.
Weaponisation of aid and attacks on healthcare: MSF
Statement on 21 May from Jerusalem: While Israeli authorities let an insufficient amount of aid into Gaza to pretend the siege is over, ground operations continue to damage and put medical facilities out of service.
On 19 May, a strike hit Nasser hospital’s compound, damaging the Ministry of Health’s pharmacy store at a time when supplies are already running low.
Attacks on medical care must stop now and aid must enter Gaza in sufficient quantities.
he insufficient amount of aid being allowed into the Gaza Strip, Palestine, is merely a smokescreen to pretend the siege is over. Meanwhile, at least 20 medical facilities in Gaza have been damaged, or forced partially or completely out of service, in the past week by advancing Israeli ground operations, intensified airstrikes, and widespread evacuation orders.
As people remain in desperate need of medical care and aid, Israeli authorities must stop the deliberate asphyxiation of Gaza and the annihilation of its healthcare system, that is underpinning their campaign of ethnic cleansing.
“The Israeli authorities’ decision to allow a ridiculously inadequate amount of aid into Gaza after months of an air-tight siege signals their intention to avoid the accusation of starving people in Gaza, while in fact keeping them barely surviving,” says Pascale Coissard, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) emergency coordinator in Khan Younis.
“This plan is a way to instrumentalise aid, making it a tool to further Israeli forces’ military objectives.”
The Israeli authorities’ decision to allow a ridiculously inadequate amount of aid into Gaza after months of an air-tight siege signals their intention to avoid the accusation of starving people in Gaza, while in fact keeping them barely surviving. Pascale Coissard, MSF emergency coordinator in Khan Younis
Before October 2023, 500 aid trucks were entering Gaza every day, according to the UN. The current authorisation for 100 per day, when the situation is so dire, is woefully inadequate.
Meanwhile, evacuation orders are continuing to uproot people, while Israeli forces are still subjecting health facilities to intensive attacks.
On 19 May, between 6 and 6.30am, MSF teams reported hearing almost one strike per minute in Khan Younis. One of these strikes hit the Nasser hospital compound, 100 metres away from the intensive care unit and the inpatient department that are run by MSF.
This is the third time in two months that Nasser hospital compound has been struck, once again depriving people of treatment and care. To reduce exposure, our teams were forced to temporarily close both the outpatient department and sedation room for patients awaiting or recovering from surgery, as well as suspend physiotherapy and mental health activities, which are essential for burn patients – most of whom are children.
The strikes on 19 May also severely damaged the Ministry of Health pharmacy store in Nasser hospital. This puts additional pressure on supplies at a time when medical stocks are running critically low due to the siege.
As part of the expansion of their ground operations, Israeli forces have issued widescale evacuation orders, further limiting people’s access to medical care and MSF’s ability to provide it. On 19 May, for example, an evacuation order covering almost the entire eastern part of Khan Younis, at the edge of Nasser hospital, forced people to immediately move towards Al-Mawasi area.
The Site Management Cluster estimates that over 138,900 people were forcibly displaced between 15-20 May. The intensified Israeli bombardments and evacuation orders across Khan Younis have forced MSF to maintain only lifesaving activities in the emergency rooms of Al-Attar and Al-Mawasi clinics. Since yesterday, Al-Hakker clinic, in Deir Al-Balah, has also been closed. Before that, MSF teams had been providing more than 350 consultations per day for paediatric, antenatal and post-natal care, psychological first aid and outpatient nutrition treatment among other things.
A few days earlier, on 15 May, Israeli authorities issued an evacuation order to Sheikh Radwan basic healthcare centre in Gaza City, which led to the closure of the facility. Before that, with MSF’s support, the Ministry of Health teams were providing around 3,000 consultations per day in an area with estimated 250,000 people. This was the last fully functional public basic healthcare clinic in the area.
According to the Ministry of Health, following the besiege of the Indonesian hospital, all public hospitals in North Gaza are now out of service. The MSF field hospital in Deir Al-Balah has seen its bed capacity rise to 150 per cent over the last few days, forcing us to add additional staff and increase our baseline by 20 beds. According to the UN, there are currently around 1,000 functional hospital beds across the Strip, while bed capacity before the war was 3,500.
Attacks on civilians and healthcare must stop now and aid must enter Gaza in sufficient quantities and in a way that allows it to reach those who need it. Israel’s allies must exert all their pressure to make this happen as a matter of extreme urgency. Every day that is lost reinforces their complicity in the annihilation of the people of Gaza.
Healthcare destroyed: WHO
Statement on 22 May: Israel’s intensified military operations continue to threaten an already weakened health system, amidst worsening mass population displacement and acute shortages of food, water, medical supplies, fuel and shelter.
Four major hospitals in Gaza (Kamal Adwan Hospital, Indonesia Hospital, Hamad Hospital for Rehabilitation and Prosthetics, and European Gaza Hospital) have had to suspend medical services in the past week due to their proximity to hostilities or evacuation zones, and attacks. WHO has recorded 28 attacks on health care in Gaza during this period and 697 attacks since October 2023.
Only 19 of Gaza Strip’s 36 hospitals remain operational, including one hospital providing basic care for the remaining patients still inside the hospital, and are struggling under severe supply shortages, lack of health workers, persistent insecurity, and a surge of casualties, all while staff work in impossible conditions.
Of the 19 hospitals, 12 provide a variety of health services, while the rest are only able to provide basic emergency care. At least 94% of all hospitals in the Gaza Strip are damaged or destroyed.
The increased hostilities and new evacuation orders issued across northern and southern Gaza in the past two days threaten to push even more health facilities out of service. This includes 1 hospital, 11 primary care centres, and 13 medical points within the evacuation zones, and an additional 5 hospitals, 1 field hospital, 9 primary care centres, and 23 medical points within 1000 metres of those zones.
North Gaza has been stripped of nearly all health care. Al-Awda Hospital is only minimally functional, serving as a trauma stabilization point. It faces an imminent risk of closure due to ongoing insecurity and restricted access. The hospital’s third floor was reportedly attacked on Wednesday, injuring a staff member. Hostilities in the area also damaged the water tank and pipeline. Today, the hospital was attacked again. The third and fourth floors were reportedly hit, injuring two health workers. Patient triage tents, including one provided by WHO, caught fire, which also burned all medical supplies in the warehouse and destroyed vehicles in the basement. A WHO mission attempting to reach the hospital today was impeded.
The Indonesian Hospital is out of service due to continued military presence since 18 May, making it inaccessible. Yesterday, a WHO mission to the hospital was forced to abort due to the security situation after waiting nearly four hours for clearance to proceed. WHO team had planned to deliver food and water to patients, assess their conditions, and identify critical equipment for transfer. WHO tried to reach the hospital again today, but the mission was impeded.
Kamal Adwan Hospital, which had the only centre to treat patients with severe acute malnutrition in North Gaza, went out of service on 20 May after intense hostilities in its vicinity, forcing patients to evacuate or be discharged prematurely.
In southern Gaza, Nasser Medical Complex, Al-Amal, and Al-Aqsa hospitals are overwhelmed by a surge of injured people, worsened by a new wave of displacement to Deir al Balah and Khan Younis. The European Gaza Hospital remains out of service following an attack on 13 May, cutting off vital services including neurosurgery, cardiac care, and cancer treatment – all unavailable elsewhere in Gaza.
Currently, across the Gaza Strip, only 2,000 hospital beds remain available, for a population of over 2 million people, grossly insufficient to meet the current needs. Of these, at least 40 beds are at risk of being lost as they are in hospitals within newly declared evacuation zones, while an additional 850 could be lost if conditions deteriorate at facilities near these zones.
Continued hostilities and military presence inhibit patients from accessing care, obstruct staff from providing care, and prevent WHO and partners from resupplying hospitals.
With each hospital forced out of service, patients lose access to health care, and WHO and partners’ efforts, to sustain Gaza’s health system are undone. The destruction is systematic. Hospitals are rehabilitated and resupplied, only to be exposed to hostilities or attacked again. This destructive cycle must end.
Amid constant fear and insecurity, health workers, including those from national and international emergency medical teams, continue delivering urgent care in Gaza. WHO salutes their courage and commitment.
WHO calls for the active protection of healthcare. Hospitals must never be militarised or targeted.
WHO calls for aid at scale to be allowed into Gaza through all possible routes, and for unimpeded humanitarian access to reach people wherever they are. Echoing the United Nations’ Relief Chief, WHO reiterates that the UN and its partners have a clear, principled and effective plan to deliver aid with safeguards against diversion, a system that has worked and must be enabled to continue.
WHO calls for an immediate and lasting ceasefire.
Other commentary
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