logo
UN says more than 737,000 newly displaced in Gaza since March

UN says more than 737,000 newly displaced in Gaza since March

Sinar Daily18-07-2025
Over the past 21 months, nearly everyone has been displaced, typically multiple times.
18 Jul 2025 09:46am
Palestinians salvage items from the debris of a tent which was hit in Israeli strikes a day earlier, at the UNRWA-run Abou Helou school for girls at the Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip on July 17, 2025. (Photo by Eyad BABA / AFP)
HAMILTON - The United Nations (UN) said Thursday that more than 737,000 people have been displaced in the Gaza Strip since an escalation of Israeli attacks in March, underscoring the scale of the humanitarian crisis facing the population, Anadolu Ajansi (AA) reported.
Citing the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), spokesperson Stephanie Tremblay reported at a news conference that "between the 8th and the 15th of July, more than 11,500 people were newly displaced." Palestinians salvage items from the debris of a tent which was hit in Israeli strikes a day earlier, at the UNRWA-run Abou Helou school for girls at the Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip on July 17, 2025. (Photo by Eyad BABA / AFP)
"That brings overall displacement since the latest escalation of hostilities on March 18th to over 737,000 people - that's about 35 per cent of Gaza's population.
"And over the past 21 months, nearly everyone has been displaced, typically multiple times," she noted.
Tremblay said Israeli strikes in the last 24 hours hit sites sheltering displaced Palestinians, with reports of injuries and fatalities.
Despite mounting needs, she said that only a limited amount of humanitarian aid is reaching the enclave.
Tremblay described the delivery of benzene for the first time in more than 135 days as a "small but important step forward," noting that benzene is essential for powering ambulances and critical services.
"But it's not enough," she stressed.
On the Israeli strike against a church in Gaza, Tremblay said UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres "strongly condemns today's reports of an Israeli strike on the Holy Family Church in Gaza, a place of worship and a sanctuary for civilians."
"Attacks on places of worship are unacceptable. People seeking shelter must be respected and protected, not hit by strikes," she added, reiterating demands for an immediate ceasefire.
She reiterated Guterres' call "on all parties to ensure that civilians are respected and protected at all times and allow humanitarian aid to flow into the Strip at scale."
In response to a question by Anadolu on Israel's reported reassignment of administrative control of the Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron to a settler council, Tremblay said the UN had not seen the report, but emphasised: "We always call for the protection of all religious sites."
On Tuesday, Israeli media reported that Tel Aviv removed the Hebron municipality's administrative authority over the Ibrahimi Mosque and reassigned it to a settler council.
The Ibrahimi Mosque, also known as the Tomb of the Patriarchs, is a site sacred to Muslims and Jews. Tensions over control and access have long made the mosque a flashpoint in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The Israeli move marks the first major shift in the status of the mosque since the 1994 recommendations of the Shamgar Commission, which divided access, allocating 63 per cent of the site to Jewish worshippers and 37 per cent to Muslims.
The division followed the 1994 massacre by extremist settler Baruch Goldstein, who killed 29 Palestinian worshippers during dawn prayers.
The mosque is located in the Old City in an area under full Israeli control where roughly 400 illegal settlers live under the protection of 1,500 Israeli soldiers. - BERNAMA-ANADOLU
More Like This
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

UN races to reach Gaza's starving as Israel allows limited pause, secure aid routes
UN races to reach Gaza's starving as Israel allows limited pause, secure aid routes

Malay Mail

timean hour ago

  • Malay Mail

UN races to reach Gaza's starving as Israel allows limited pause, secure aid routes

GENEVA, July 28 — The United Nations said it would try to reach as many starving people as possible in Gaza after Israel announced it would establish secure land routes for humanitarian convoys. The UN's World Food Programme (WFP) said it had enough food in, or on its way to, the region to feed the 2.1 million people in the Gaza Strip for almost three months. UN emergency relief coordinator Tom Fletcher said the United Nations would try to reach 'as many starving people as we can' in the time window. Israel on Sunday began a limited 'tactical pause' in military operations to allow the UN and aid agencies to tackle the deepening hunger crisis. 'We welcome Israel's decision to support a one-week scale-up of aid, including lifting customs barriers on food, medicine and fuel from Egypt and the reported designation of secure routes for UN humanitarian convoys,' Fletcher said in a statement. Fletcher said some movement restrictions appeared to have been eased on Sunday, citing initial reports indicating that over 100 truckloads of aid were collected. 'But we need sustained action, and fast, including quicker clearances for convoys going to the crossing and dispatching into Gaza; multiple trips per day to the crossings so we and our partners can pick up the cargo; safe routes that avoid crowded areas; and no more attacks on people gathering for food.' The UN aid chief said the world was calling out for life-saving humanitarian assistance to get through — but stressed that 'vast amounts of aid are needed to stave off famine and a catastrophic health crisis'. 'Ultimately of course we don't just need a pause — we need a permanent ceasefire,' he added. No shootings near convoys pledge WFP said the pauses and corridors should allow emergency food to be safely delivered. 'Food aid is the only real way for most people inside Gaza to eat,' it said in a statement. It said a third of the population had not been eating for days, and 470,000 people in Gaza 'are enduring famine-like conditions' that were leading to deaths. WFP said more than 62,000 tonnes of food assistance was needed monthly to cover the entire Gaza population of two million. The agency noted that, on top of Sunday's 'pause' announcement, Israel had pledged to allow more trucks to enter Gaza with quicker clearances along with 'assurances of no armed forces or shootings near convoys'. 'Together, we hope these measures will allow for a surge in urgently needed food assistance to reach hungry people without further delays,' it said. 'Dystopian landscape' UN rights chief Volker Turk said Israel, as the occupying power in Gaza, was obliged to ensure sufficient food was provided to the population. 'Children are starving and dying in front of our eyes. Gaza is a dystopian landscape of deadly attacks and total destruction,' he said in a statement. He criticised a US- and Israel-backed outfit, called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), that in late May began distributing foodstuffs when UN-organised efforts were blocked. Turk said the GHF's 'chaotic, militarised distribution sites were 'failing utterly to deliver humanitarian aid at the scope and scale needed'. His office says Israeli forces have killed more than 1,000 Palestinians trying to get food aid in Gaza since the GHF started operations — nearly three-quarters of them in the vicinity of GHF sites. — AFP

Aid trucks move from Egypt to Gaza after Israel said it began airdrops
Aid trucks move from Egypt to Gaza after Israel said it began airdrops

Free Malaysia Today

time19 hours ago

  • Free Malaysia Today

Aid trucks move from Egypt to Gaza after Israel said it began airdrops

Trucks loaded with humanitarian aid wait on the Egyptian side of the Rafah border crossing. (AFP pic) CAIRO : Aid trucks started moving towards Gaza from Egypt, the Egyptian state-affiliated Al Qahera News TV said on Sunday, after months of international pressure and warnings from relief agencies of starvation spreading in the Palestinian enclave. Israel said that it began aid airdrops to Gaza on Saturday and was taking several other steps to ease the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. The Israeli military said 'humanitarian corridors' would be established for the safe movement of UN convoys delivering aid to Gazans and that 'humanitarian pauses' would be implemented in densely populated areas. Dozens of trucks carrying tonnes of humanitarian aid moved towards the Karam Abu Salem (Kerem Shalom) crossing in southern Gaza, the Al Qahera correspondent said from the Rafah border crossing between Egypt and Gaza. International aid organisations say there is mass hunger among Gaza's 2.2 million people, with food running out after Israel cut off all supplies to the territory in March, before resuming it in May with new restrictions. Israel says it has let enough food into Gaza and accuses the UN of failing to distribute it. The UN says it is operating as effectively as possible under Israeli restrictions. Israel's announcement on airdrops came after indirect ceasefire talks in Doha between Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas were broken off with no deal in sight. The Israeli military said in a statement that the airdrops would be conducted in coordination with international aid organisations and would include seven pallets of aid containing flour, sugar and canned food. Palestinian sources confirmed that aid had begun dropping in northern Gaza. Israel's foreign ministry said the military would 'apply a 'humanitarian pause' in civilian centres and in humanitarian corridors' on Sunday morning. It provided no further details. 'The IDF emphasises that there is no starvation in the Gaza Strip; this is a false campaign promoted by Hamas,' the Israeli military said in its Saturday statement. 'Responsibility for food distribution to the population in Gaza lies with the UN and international aid organisations. Therefore, the UN and international organisations are expected to improve the effectiveness of aid distribution and to ensure that the aid does not reach Hamas.' Aid ship intercepted The Israeli military stressed that despite the humanitarian steps, 'combat operations have not ceased' in the Gaza Strip. Separately, international activists on an aid ship that set sail from Italy en route to Gaza said in a post on X that the vessel had been intercepted. The Israeli foreign ministry said on X that naval forces 'stopped the vessel from illegally entering the maritime zone off the coast of Gaza' and that it was being taken to Israeli shores and all passengers were safe. The UN said on Thursday that humanitarian pauses in Gaza would allow 'the scaling up of humanitarian assistance' and said Israel had not provided enough route alternatives for its convoys, hindering aid access. Dozens of Gazans have died of malnutrition in the past few weeks, according to the Gaza health ministry, while 127 people have died due to malnutrition, including 85 children, since the start of the war, which began nearly two years ago. On Wednesday, more than 100 aid agencies warned that mass starvation was spreading across the enclave. The military also said on Saturday that it had connected a power line to a desalination plant, expected to supply daily water needs for about 900,000 Gazans. Israel launched its assault on Gaza after Hamas-led fighters stormed Israeli towns near the border, killing some 1,200 people and capturing 251 hostages on Oct 7, 2023. Since then, Israeli forces have killed nearly 60,000 people in Gaza, health officials there say, and reduced much of the enclave to ruins.

Stop this mass murder by starvation
Stop this mass murder by starvation

The Star

timea day ago

  • The Star

Stop this mass murder by starvation

Dying slowly: Displaced Palestinian mother Samah Matar holding her malnourished son Youssef at a school where they are sheltering amid a hunger crisis in Gaza City. — Reuters IT'S plain murder on a massive scale, starving the Palestinians to death in defiance of global opinion. What is happening in Gaza now is one of the world's worst hunger crises being deliberately carried out right before our eyes. Follow us on our official WhatsApp channel for breaking news alerts and key updates! Wong Chun Wai began his career as a journalist in Penang, and has served The Star for over 35 years in various capacities and roles. He is now group editorial and corporate affairs adviser to the group, after having served as group managing director/chief executive officer. On The Beat made its debut on Feb 23 1997 and Chun Wai has penned the column weekly without a break, except for the occasional press holiday when the paper was not published. In May 2011, a compilation of selected articles of On The Beat was published as a book and launched in conjunction with his 50th birthday. Chun Wai also comments on current issues in The Star.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store