According to UN estimates, since the conflict began on October 7, Israeli military forces have targeted Gaza hospitals and other critical medical facilities nearly 600 times. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), a UN health agency, over 770 people have been injured and 613 people have died inside of hospitals during this time.
The World Health Organization has condemned the ongoing attacks on Gaza’s healthcare facilities. Spokesman Christian Lindmeier expressed concern about the impact on the people of Gaza as well as the shrinking humanitarian space. With disease cases on the rise, nutrition levels falling, and hostilities approaching their fourteenth week, children in the Gaza Strip are facing a triple threat. Living conditions are rapidly deteriorating, and thousands of children have already lost their lives.
In the nearly 100 days since continuous Israeli airstrikes started in Gaza, over 550 medical facilities and vehicles have been impacted, according to the WHO’s online platform tracking attacks on healthcare. In the enclave, 26 of the 36 hospitals have sustained damage.
Catherine Russell, the director of UNICEF, stressed that children in Gaza are living a worsening nightmare, with food shortages, water shortages, and avoidable diseases putting their lives in danger. There has been a noticeable increase in diarrhea cases in children under five, which suggests that Gaza’s child health is rapidly declining.
Conditions on the ground, such as security risks, mobility restrictions, delays, and denials, continuously hinder the pace and volume of relief efforts, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). There have been fatalities among aid workers and ongoing bombardment of Gaza’s aid operations.
Since October 7, up to 1.9 million people—representing over 85% of the population—have been displaced throughout the Gaza Strip, according to a report by UNRWA, the UN agency that aids Palestinians. In response to the dire humanitarian needs in the Occupied Palestinian Territories and the surrounding nations impacted by the ongoing hostilities in Gaza, the UN’s migration agency, IOM, has launched an urgent appeal for $69 million.