UNITED NATIONS: United Nations aid operations in the Gaza Strip continued on Tuesday, a day after a senior UN official said humanitarian efforts had ground to a halt because new Israeli evacuation orders forced the shutdown of the main UN operations center.
UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric on Tuesday appeared to temper the remarks by the UN official, who spoke on Monday on condition of anonymity. When asked if conditions in Gaza had caused a halt to UN aid deliveries on Monday, Dujarric told reporters: “The conditions in Gaza yesterday made it extremely, extremely difficult for us to do our work.”
“We are doing what we can with what we have,” he said. “We’ve been saying from the beginning — this is aid delivery by seizing every opportunity, seizing every crack that we can fill. So every situation is assessed day by day, hour by hour.”
UN safety and security chief Gilles Michaud said on Tuesday that over the weekend the Israeli military only gave a few hours notice for more than 200 UN personnel to move out of offices and living spaces in Deir Al-Balah in central Gaza.
He said the “the timing could hardly be worse” with a massive polio vaccination campaign due to start shortly that required large numbers of UN staff to enter Gaza.
“The United Nations is determined to stay in Gaza,” he said in a statement. “Humanitarian aid delivery continues – a tremendous feat given that we are operating at the upper-most peripheries of tolerable risk.”
The International Rescue Committee said on Tuesday that the new evacuation orders by Israel had forced it and other humanitarian groups to “halt aid operations, during what is already a dire situation for civilians.”
“It’s urgent that humanitarian actors can continue their work, without threat from displacement or military operations. We urge all parties to protect civilians and facilitate humanitarian access at all times,” the organization posted on X.
The current war in the Palestinian enclave began on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas gunmen stormed into Israeli communities, killing around 1,200 people and abducting about 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.
Since then, Israel’s military has leveled swathes of the Palestinian enclave, driving nearly all of its 2.3 million people from their homes, giving rise to deadly hunger and disease and killing at least 40,000 people, according to Palestinian health authorities.
The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said on Tuesday that Gaza’s population was increasingly being told by Israel “to concentrate within the Israeli-designated zone in Al Mawasi, which spans to only about 41 square kilometers or roughly 11 percent of Gaza’s total area.”
It said overcrowding, with a density of 30,000 to 34,000 individuals per square kilometer (77,000 to 87,000 per square mile), had exacerbated a dire shortage of essential resources such as water, sanitation and hygiene supplies, health services, protection and shelter.
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UN ‘doing what it can’ to deliver Gaza aid as evacuation orders cause extreme difficulties
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UN ‘doing what it can’ to deliver Gaza aid as evacuation orders cause extreme difficulties
- UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric: ‘We’ve been saying from the beginning — this is aid delivery by seizing every opportunity, seizing every crack that we can fill’
- International Rescue Committee: ‘It’s urgent that humanitarian actors can continue their work, without threat from displacement or military operations’
Hezbollah chief accuses Israel of ignoring ceasefire agreement
- Naim Qassem says moves to disarm his group in Lebanon are an 'Israeli-American plan'
- Lebanese military is expected to complete Hezbollah’s disarmament south of Litani River as oart of ceasefire
BEIRUT: Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem on Sunday said moves to disarm the group in Lebanon are an “Israeli-American plan,” accusing Israel of failing to abide by a ceasefire agreement sealed last year.
Under heavy US pressure and fears of expanded Israeli strikes, the Lebanese military is expected to complete Hezbollah’s disarmament south of the Litani River — located about 30 kilometers (19 miles) from the border with Israel — by the end of the year.
It will then tackle disarming the Iran-backed movement in the rest of the country.
“Disarmament is an Israeli-American plan,” Qassem said.
“To demand exclusive arms control while Israel is committing aggression and America is imposing its will on Lebanon, stripping it of its power, means that you are not working in Lebanon’s interest, but rather in the interest of what Israel wants.”
Despite a November 2024 ceasefire that was supposed to end more than a year of hostilities between Israel and the Iran-backed Hezbollah group, Israel has kept up strikes on Lebanon and has maintained troops in five areas it deems strategic.
According to the agreement, Hezbollah was required to pull its forces north of the Litani River and have its military infrastructure in the vacated area dismantled.
Israel has questioned the Lebanese military’s effectiveness and has accused Hezbollah of rearming, while the group itself has rejected calls to surrender its weapons.
“The deployment of the Lebanese army south of the Litani River was required only if Israel had adhered to its commitments... to halting the aggression, withdrawing, releasing prisoners, and having reconstruction commence,” Qassem said in a televised address.
“With the Israeli enemy not implementing any of the steps of the agreement... Lebanon is no longer required to take any action on any level before the Israelis commit to what they are obligated to do.”
Lebanese army chief Rodolphe Haykal told a military meeting on Tuesday “the army is in the process of finishing the first phase of its plan.”
He said the army is carefully planning “for the subsequent phases” of disarmament.
Under heavy US pressure and fears of expanded Israeli strikes, the Lebanese military is expected to complete Hezbollah’s disarmament south of the Litani River — located about 30 kilometers (19 miles) from the border with Israel — by the end of the year.
It will then tackle disarming the Iran-backed movement in the rest of the country.
“Disarmament is an Israeli-American plan,” Qassem said.
“To demand exclusive arms control while Israel is committing aggression and America is imposing its will on Lebanon, stripping it of its power, means that you are not working in Lebanon’s interest, but rather in the interest of what Israel wants.”
Despite a November 2024 ceasefire that was supposed to end more than a year of hostilities between Israel and the Iran-backed Hezbollah group, Israel has kept up strikes on Lebanon and has maintained troops in five areas it deems strategic.
According to the agreement, Hezbollah was required to pull its forces north of the Litani River and have its military infrastructure in the vacated area dismantled.
Israel has questioned the Lebanese military’s effectiveness and has accused Hezbollah of rearming, while the group itself has rejected calls to surrender its weapons.
“The deployment of the Lebanese army south of the Litani River was required only if Israel had adhered to its commitments... to halting the aggression, withdrawing, releasing prisoners, and having reconstruction commence,” Qassem said in a televised address.
“With the Israeli enemy not implementing any of the steps of the agreement... Lebanon is no longer required to take any action on any level before the Israelis commit to what they are obligated to do.”
Lebanese army chief Rodolphe Haykal told a military meeting on Tuesday “the army is in the process of finishing the first phase of its plan.”
He said the army is carefully planning “for the subsequent phases” of disarmament.
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