Eyes forced shut, hospital crammed: Children fill Rafah graveyards
4 Min Read
James Elder, the UNICEF's global spokesperson, reports that the European Hospital in Rafah holds scores of severely wounded dying children.
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Palestinian children stand amid the debris of a house destroyed by overnight Israeli bombardment in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip. (AFP)
UNICEF's global spokesperson James Elder has reported on the many horrors he witnessed in Rafah, warning that a potential invasion would be "catastrophic".
During three visits to the European Hospital's ICU in Rafah, Gaza, Elder recalls how he observed many youngsters lying on the same bed after a bomb tore their house. Despite the physicians' best attempts, they all died.
Elder recalls how mere weeks earlier, the world was outraged at the killing of seven World Central Kitchen humanitarian aid workers and a week later, a UNICEF van was attacked, as it attempted to deliver much-needed aid.
He questions whether things could get any worse in Rafah from "the looming famine to soaring death tolls" and notes that it seems that in Gaza things can always get worse, citing the "breaking of humanity's darkest records."
Elder emphasizes that Rafah would completely implode if attacked, as there are over 1.4 million residents residing there in deplorable conditions. "There is simply nowhere left to go in Gaza," he says, citing the severe shortage of water for drinking and sanitation and the one shared toilet per 850 people.
According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics on Thursday, before the Israeli aggression began, Rafah had a population density of 4,360 people per square kilometer, whereas now it has reached 17,500 individuals per square kilometer.
The city of children
The spokesperson details that the city is a haven for young children, in addition to housing Gaza's largest remaining hospital, the European Hospital, which is now more crucial than ever after Gaza's health system has been destroyed.
Since the Israeli aggression began in Gaza more than 6 months ago, Israeli occupation forces (IOF) have destroyed hospitals, bombed ambulances, and killed or detained hundreds of healthcare workers.
The UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Health Tlaleng Mofokeng announced last week that at least 350 healthcare workers have been killed and 520 others have been injured in Gaza since October 7.
According to the UN special rapporteur, many teenagers would volunteer in Gaza's hospitals to help medical workers deal with the vast number of those injured and killed, but they have not been listed among the casualties since they weren't officially registered as medical workers.
"The health system in Gaza has been completely obliterated and the right to health has been decimated at every level. The conditions are incompatible with the realization of everyone to the highest attainable state of physical and mental health," she added.
Elder looks back on how Gaza was called a graveyard for children in October, disclosing that he saw new graveyards in Rafah only last month piled with the remains of innocent children targeted by Israeli strikes, calling it the worst devastation he has seen in "20 years with the UN."
In December, Elder made a statement in which he called the attack on Gaza a "war on children" from inside a crowded hospital in Gaza, criticizing the international community's impotence, saying the "inaction by those with influence is allowing the killing of children."
The UNICEF spokesperson demanded a humanitarian ceasefire and increased flow of humanitarian aid and sadly recalled how a woman in Gaza pleaded with him to urge the world to respond to their plight.
Although he attempted to relieve her of her anxiety, the woman continued to plead, because, as Elder puts it "she assumed the world did not know what was happening in Gaza. Because if the world knew, how could they possibly let this happen?"
