LONDON: UN officials warned on Wednesday of a potential “slaughter of innocents” unless aid reached a Palestinian refugee camp in Syria where thousands of civilians are trapped up in a vicious battle.
Some 18,000 civilians, including 3,500 children, are caught in the camp outside Damascus just a few miles from President Bashar Assad’s palace. The camp largely fell under Islamic State control last week and is surrounded by the Syrian army.
The Yarmouk camp has been held by anti-Assad insurgents and besieged by government troops since the early days of the war and many have already fled. But as fighting intensified in and around the camp, the remaining refugees have been left without food, water and medical supplies prompting aid agencies to call for evacuations.
“The level of inhumanity that Yarmouk has descended to is frankly unimaginable,” Chris Gunness, a spokesman for the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in a Skype interview from Jerusalem.
“The situation is absolutely desperate. We need urgently to have humanitarian access, which is why UNRWA is calling for all parties to exercise influence with their clients on the ground so that we can get into the camp.”
Gunness said since the fighting escalated a week ago, UNRWA aid convoys have not been able to enter the camp and the already dire situation has become more desperate with people left without water, food or medicine and the growing risk of disease.
Gunness said a few Palestinian charities had managed to get some supplies to the camp but otherwise people were cut off with the risk of disease rising daily.
“When you have public health system completely shot to pieces, when you have such terrible levels of food insecurity ... disease is going to soar,” said Gunness.
“We have tragic pictures of children and others scooping up water out of holes in the streets.”
Gunness said UNRWA had not been a regular presence in the camp for at least two years so it was impossible to estimate the number of people now ill or the death toll.
The war in Syria has killed 220,000 people and displaced millions of Syrians.
The United Nations has said it is extremely concerned about the safety and protection of Syrian and Palestinian civilians at the Yarmouk camp.
Gunness said an estimated 94 civilians, including 43 women and 20 children, managed to leave the camp on Sunday and were provided with humanitarian support so there was no reason why more could not be helped to safety.
“For me it is unconceivable that the so-called civilized world can stand and watch what is going on in Yarmouk,” he said.
“We are facing a potential slaughter of the innocents and the world cannot stand by and watch that happen.”
Yarmouk situation desperate, says UN
Yarmouk situation desperate, says UN
Israel police to deploy around Al-Aqsa for Ramadan, Palestinians report curbs
- The Al-Aqsa compound is a central symbol of Palestinian identity and also a frequent flashpoint
JERUSALEM: Israeli police said Monday that they would deploy in force around the Al?Aqsa Mosque during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which begins this week, as Palestinian officials accused Israel of imposing restrictions at the compound.
Over the course of the month of fasting and prayer, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians traditionally attend prayers at Al?Aqsa — Islam’s third-holiest site, located in east Jerusalem, which Israel captured in 1967 and later annexed.
Arad Braverman, a senior Jerusalem police officer, said forces would be deployed “day and night” across the compound, known to Jews as the Temple Mount, and in the surrounding area.
He said thousands of police would also be on duty for Friday prayers, which draw the largest crowds of Muslim worshippers.
Braverman said police had recommended issuing 10,000 permits for Palestinians from the occupied West Bank, who require special permission to enter Jerusalem.
He did not say whether age limits would apply, adding that the final number of people would be decided by the government.
The Palestinian Jerusalem Governorate said in a separate statement it had been informed that permits would again be restricted to men over 55 and women over 50, mirroring last year’s criteria.
It said Israeli authorities had blocked the Islamic Waqf — the Jordanian?run body administering the site — from carrying out routine preparations, including installing shade structures and setting up temporary medical clinics.
A Waqf source confirmed the restrictions and said 33 of its employees had been barred from entering the compound in the week before Ramadan.
The Al-Aqsa compound is a central symbol of Palestinian identity and also a frequent flashpoint.
Under long?standing arrangements, Jews may visit the compound — which they revere as the site of their second temple, destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD — but they are not permitted to pray there.
Israel says it is committed to maintaining this status quo, though Palestinians fear it is being eroded.
Braverman reiterated Monday that no changes were planned.
In recent years, a growing number of Jewish ultranationalists have challenged the prayer ban, including far?right politician Itamar Ben?Gvir, who prayed at the site while serving as national security minister in 2024 and 2025.
