Gaza conditions go from catastrophic to near collapse, says Unicef as it happened | Middle

Gaza situation goes from 'catastrophe to near collapse', says Unicef

Children in Gaza are suffering from “horrific conditions” and the Palestinian territory remains the most dangerous place in the world to be a child, the deputy chief of the UN children’s agency says.

Ted Chaiban said at the end of a three-day visit to Gaza on Thursday that since his last visit two months ago “the situation has gone from catastrophe to near collapse”.

If the staggering decline in conditions persists, “we could see deaths due to indiscriminate conflict compounded by deaths due to disease and hunger”, the Unicef deputy executive director said in a statement, Associated Press reports.

Chaiban said he met an 11-year-old girl named Sama on Tuesday at al-Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, southern Gaza. She was skipping with friends when shrapnel from a bombing pierced her abdomen, leading to the loss of her spleen. Now, he said, her immune system was compromised “in a war zone full of disease and infection”.

Ten minutes later, he said, he met 13-year-old Ibrahim who had been in a shelter in a designated safe area when everything collapsed. His badly damaged hand went untreated, became gangrenous, and his arm had to be amputated.

Chaiban said:

A matter of hours after we left, many families fled al-Nasser hospital, as fighting closed in on the area.

The “war on children” must stop, he said, pointing to figures from the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza that nearly 25,000 people have been killed since 7 October, with up to 70% of them reportedly women and children.

Closing summary

It’s almost 4.30am in Gaza City and Tel Aviv and 5.30am in Sanaa, Yemen, and we’re about to shut this blog. Our live coverage of the Middle East crisis will resume later in the day. Here’s a summary of the latest developments. Thanks for reading.

• The US has carried out a fifth strike against Houthi rebel targets in Yemen, even as Joe Biden acknowledged that bombing the rebels has yet to stop their attacks on shipping in the Red Sea. Late on Thursday US warplanes targeted anti-ship missiles that “were aimed into the southern Red Sea and prepared to launch”, according to US Central Command. The US president told reporters: “When you say working, are they stopping the Houthis? No. Are they going to continue? Yes.”

• Also on Thursday night, Houthis fired missiles at a US-owned tanker ship in the Gulf of Aden. The White House and the Houthis gave differing accounts of the launches at the Chem Ranger, with the rebels saying their naval forces had attacked “with several appropriate naval missiles, resulting in direct hits”. However, US Central Command said the Houthis launched two anti-ship ballistic missiles and that they hit the water near the ship, causing no damage or injuries. It said it was the third Houthi strike on a commercial shipping vessel in three days.

• A total of 24,620 Palestinians have been killed and 61,830 have been injured in Israeli strikes on Gaza since 7 October, according to the latest figures by the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry on Thursday. The figures include 172 killed and 326 injured in the past 24 hours. At least 16 people were reported killed by an Israeli airstrike on a house in Rafah, southern Gaza.

• A new wave of violence has swept the West Bank, with a series of major raids launched by the Israeli military across much of the occupied territory. Israeli forces remained in Tulkarm, in the West Bank’s north, for a second day on Thursday after launching a raid on a refugee camp there. Eight people were killed on Thursday, the Israeli military said.

• Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has told the Biden White House that he rejects any moves to establish a Palestinian state when Israel ends its offensive against Gaza, and that all territory west of the Jordan River would be under Israeli security control. His public statement on Thursday represented his sharpest rebuttal of US foreign policy. The White House responded by saying the US would continue working towards a two-state solution and that there could be no Israeli reoccupation of Gaza when the war concluded.

• Pakistan has launched retaliatory strikes against militants in Iran in response to attacks by Tehran that targeted sites within Pakistan’s borders, heightening fears of further instability across the Middle East and surrounding region. Ten people from one family were killed in the attacks, including six children, reportedly all “non Iranian nationals”.

• Children in Gaza are suffering from “horrific conditions” and the Palestinian territory remains the most dangerous place in the world to be a child, the deputy chief of the UN children’s agency says. Ted Chaiban said at the end of a three-day visit to Gaza that since his last visit two months ago “the situation has gone from catastrophe to near collapse”. If the staggering decline in conditions persisted, “we could see deaths due to indiscriminate conflict compounded by deaths due to disease and hunger”, the Unicef deputy executive director said.

• There was no word on Thursday on whether medicines that entered Gaza as part of a deal brokered by France and Qatar had been distributed to dozens of hostages with chronic illnesses who are being held by Hamas. Qatar confirmed late on Wednesday that the medicine had entered Gaza, but it was not yet clear if it had been distributed to the hostages, who are being held in secret locations.

• The EU is set to adopt sanctions against Hamas on Monday that will “target individuals and ban money transfers”, according to the French foreign ministry. EU foreign ministers were also expected to discuss possible measures against violent Israeli settlers, a ministry spokesperson said. Meanwhile, the European parliament has voted to call for a “permanent ceasefire” in the Gaza Strip, but on condition that all Israeli hostages held in the territory are released and Hamas dismantled. The resolution on Thursday, which is non-binding, stopped short of calling for an unconditional ceasefire in Gaza.

• Mexico and Chile have asked the international criminal court (ICC) to investigate possible crimes against civilians in Gaza. In a statement, Mexico’s foreign ministry said the action “is due to growing worry over the latest escalation of violence, particularly against civilian targets.” Any proceedings by the ICC would be separate from South Africa’s case accusing Israel of genocide at the UN’s international court of justice.

• An airstrike on southern Syria early on Thursday killed at least nine people and was probably carried out by Jordan’s air force, Syrian opposition activists said, after the latest in a series of strikes in an area where cross-border drug smugglers have been active. There was no immediate confirmation from Jordan on the strike that hit the province of Sweida, and there was some confusion over the number of people killed.

• Israel has joined a notorious band of authoritarian states with a history of imprisoning journalists by detaining Palestinian reporters without trial since the beginning of the latest war in Gaza. A report by the Committee to Protect Journalists released on Thursday said that for the first time, Israel figures in its list of “worst jailers of journalists”, putting it on a par with Iran.

Gaza situation goes from 'catastrophe to near collapse', says Unicef

Children in Gaza are suffering from “horrific conditions” and the Palestinian territory remains the most dangerous place in the world to be a child, the deputy chief of the UN children’s agency says.

Ted Chaiban said at the end of a three-day visit to Gaza on Thursday that since his last visit two months ago “the situation has gone from catastrophe to near collapse”.

If the staggering decline in conditions persists, “we could see deaths due to indiscriminate conflict compounded by deaths due to disease and hunger”, the Unicef deputy executive director said in a statement, Associated Press reports.

Chaiban said he met an 11-year-old girl named Sama on Tuesday at al-Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, southern Gaza. She was skipping with friends when shrapnel from a bombing pierced her abdomen, leading to the loss of her spleen. Now, he said, her immune system was compromised “in a war zone full of disease and infection”.

Ten minutes later, he said, he met 13-year-old Ibrahim who had been in a shelter in a designated safe area when everything collapsed. His badly damaged hand went untreated, became gangrenous, and his arm had to be amputated.

Chaiban said:

A matter of hours after we left, many families fled al-Nasser hospital, as fighting closed in on the area.

The “war on children” must stop, he said, pointing to figures from the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza that nearly 25,000 people have been killed since 7 October, with up to 70% of them reportedly women and children.

US says no damage to ship from Houthi missile attack as rebels claim 'direct hits'

The White House and Houthi rebels have given differing accounts of a Houthi attack on a US-owned tanker ship on Thursday night.

The Huthis said on social media that their “naval” forces had attacked the Chem Ranger in the Gulf of Aden “with several appropriate naval missiles, resulting in direct hits”.

However, US Central Command said later that the Houthi launched two anti-ship ballistic missiles at the Chem Ranger and that they hit water near the ship, causing no damage to the vessel or injuries.

It said on X (formerly Twitter) that the third Houthi strike on a commercial shipping vessel in three days occurred about 9pm local time.

The Chem Ranger continued its journey after the incident, it added, saying the tanker ship was Marshall Island-flagged, US-owned and Greek-operated.

The US military says Yemeni Houthis have launched two anti-ship ballistic missiles at a US-owned tanker ship, Reuters reports in a breaking news snap.

There was no reported damage or injuries, the US said.

More on this story as it emerges.

Earlier on Friday, the Houthis claimed to have targeted a US ship in the Gulf of Aden with naval missiles, resulting in “direct hits”.

It was not immediately clear if the reports referred to the same attack.

There was no word on Thursday on whether medicines that entered Gaza as part of a deal brokered by France and Qatar had been distributed to dozens hostages with chronic illnesses who are being held by Hamas.

The agreement was the first to be brokered between the warring sides since November and includes large shipments of medicine, food and humanitarian aid for Palestinian civilians as well.

Associated Press reports that Qatar confirmed late on Wednesday that the medicine had entered Gaza, but it was not yet clear if it had been distributed to the hostages, who are being held in secret locations including underground bunkers.

The International Committee for the Red Cross, which helped facilitate the hostage releases, said it was not involved in distributing the medicine.

Israeli war cabinet minister Gadi Eisenkot has appeared to criticise Benjamin Netanyahu’s pledge to completely defeat Hamas, suggesting that such rhetoric is unrealistic, the Times of Israel reports.

“Whoever speaks of absolute defeat is not speaking the truth,” Eisenkot told Channel 12’s Uvda investigative program hours after the prime minister pledged to continue the war until “complete victory” over the militant group.

Asked whether Israel’s current leadership was telling the public the truth, Eisenkot responded: “No.”

Eisenkot, a former chief of the Israel Defence Forces, also appeared to criticise Netanyahu’s refusal to hold high-level discussions regarding post-war planning in Gaza.

Eisenkot said:

The goals of the war have not yet been achieved, but the [number of soldiers on the ground] is now more limited… You have to think about what’s next.

There’s more on Yemen’s Houthi rebels claiming to have fired “naval missiles” at a US ship in the Gulf of Aden on Thursday.

The Huthis said in a statement on their social media that their “naval” forces had attacked the Chem Ranger “with several appropriate naval missiles, resulting in direct hits”, Agence France-Presse reports.

British maritime risk management company Ambrey said the Chem Ranger was a US-owned Marshall Islands-flagged chemical tanker.

“There were no crew casualties or damage reported,” the monitor said.

Chem Ranger was sailing from Jeddah in Saudi Arabia to Shuwaik in Kuwait when it reported a “suspicious” approach by drones, Ambrey said. One fell in the sea about 30 metres from the tanker, it added. “An Indian warship responded to the event.”

Huthi aggression against vessels in the Red Sea has led to strikes in Yemen by US and British forces, with the US reporting its latest attack on Huthi targets on Thursday.

The Iran-backed Huthis have launched and gradually increased attacks on Red Sea shipping since the Gaza war erupted on 7 October with the Hamas attack on Israel.

The Huthi statement said the rebels were acting against “the oppression of the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip and within the response to the American-British aggression against our country”.

The statement did not give a time or other details for the latest attack in international shipping lanes.

As the US announced its latest attack on the Huthis on Thursday, President Joe Biden said they would continue until the rebels stopped targeting ships in the Red Sea.

The US president, Joe Biden, said the clashes between Iran and Pakistan this week showed that Iran was not well-liked in the region as the White House said it did not want to see an escalation.

Pakistan launched strikes on separatist militants inside Iran on Thursday, in a retaliatory attack two days after Tehran said it struck the bases of another group within Pakistani territory.

Reuters reports Biden said on Thursday:

As you can see Iran is not particularly well liked in the region and where that goes, we’re working on now. I don’t know where that goes.

The US has been locked in a test of wills with Iran over its support for Houthi rebels in Yemen who have been launching attacks against commercial shipping in the Red Sea.

The White House national security spokesperson, John Kirby, told reporters on Air Force One as Biden flew to North Carolina that Washington was monitoring the Iran-Pakistan clashes closely.

Kirby said:

We don’t want to see an escalation clearly in South and Central Asia. And we’re in touch with our Pakistani counterparts.

Kirby said the attack on Pakistan was another example of Iran’s destabilising behaviour in the region.

• This is Adam Fulton picking up our live coverage – stay with us for the latest developments

Summary of the day so far

Here’s a recap of the latest developments:

• A total of 24,620 Palestinians have been killed and 61,830 have been injured in Israeli strikes on Gaza since 7 October, according to the latest figures by the Gaza health ministry on Thursday. The figures include 172 killed and 326 injured in the past 24 hours. At least 16 people have been killed by an Israeli airstrike on a house in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip. A relative of those killed told Al Jazeera that the family had relocated within Gaza three times for safety since 7 October. Israel’s military has repeatedly ordered Gaza’s civilian population to flee to the south.

• A new wave of violence has swept the occupied West Bank, with a series of major raids launched by the Israeli military across much of the territory. Israeli forces remained in Tulkarm, in the north of the West Bank, for a second day on Thursday after launching a raid on a refugee camp there. Eight people were killed on Thursday, the Israeli military said.

• Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has told the Biden White House that he rejects any moves to establish a Palestinian state when Israel ends its offensive against Gaza, and that all territory west of the Jordan River would be under Israeli security control. His public statement on Thursday represented his sharpest rebuttal of US foreign policy. The White House responded by saying the US would continue working towards a two-state solution and that there could be no Israeli reoccupation of Gaza when the war concluded.

• Internet and mobile services continue to be cut off inside the Gaza Strip by Israel. The present outage has lasted for five days, according to internet access advocacy group NetBlocks. An estimated 85% of Gaza’s population have been displaced and are struggling for food, while local authorites say nearly 25,000 Palestinians have so far been killed by Israeli airstrikes since 7 October.

• A Qatari foreign ministry spokesperson has admitted that it is difficult to confirm if a shipment of medicine has reached Israeli hostages held in Gaza. Majed al-Ansari said medicine and aid for Israeli hostages and Palestinian civilians had entered Gaza on Wednesday under a deal mediated by Qatar and France, and that there was every “likelihood” that the medication had reached the Israeli hostages.

• The US has carried out a fifth strike against Houthi rebel targets in Yemen, even as Joe Biden acknowledged that bombing the rebels has yet to stop their attacks on shipping in the Red Sea. Late on Thursday US warplanes targeted anti-ship missiles that “were aimed into the southern Red Sea and prepared to launch,” according to US Central Command. “When you say working, are they stopping the Houthis? No. Are they going to continue? Yes,” the US president told reporters on Thursday.

• The EU is set to adopt sanctions against Hamas on Monday that will “target individuals and ban money transfers”, according to a French foreign ministry spokesperson. EU foreign ministers are also expected to discuss possible measures against violent Israeli settlers, they said. Meanwhile, the European parliament has voted to call for a “permanent ceasefire” in the Gaza Strip, but on condition that all Israeli hostages held in the territory are released and Hamas dismantled. The resolution on Thursday, which is non-binding, stopped short of calling for an unconditional ceasefire in Gaza.

• Mexico and Chile have asked the international criminal court (ICC) to investigate possible crimes against civilians in Gaza. In a statement, Mexico’s foreign ministry said the action “is due to growing worry over the latest escalation of violence, particularly against civilian targets.” Any proceedings by the ICC would be separate from South Africa’s case accusing Israel of genocide at the UN’s international court of justice (ICJ).

• An airstrike on southern Syria early on Thursday killed at least nine people and was probably carried out by Jordan’s air force, Syrian opposition activists said, the latest in a series of strikes in an area where cross-border drug smugglers have been active. There was no immediate confirmation from Jordan on the strike that hit the province of Sweida, and there was some confusion over the number of people killed.

• Pakistan has launched retaliatory strikes against militants in Iran in response to attacks by Tehran that targeted sites within Pakistan’s borders, heightening fears of further instability across the Middle East and surrounding region. Ten people from one family were killed in the attacks, including six children, reportedly all “non Iranian nationals”.

• Israel has joined a notorious band of authoritarian states with a history of imprisoning journalists by detaining Palestinian reporters without trial since the beginning of the latest war in Gaza. A report by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) released on Thursday said that for the first time, Israel figures in its list of “worst jailers of journalists”, putting it on a par with Iran.

Mexico and Chile ask international criminal court to investigate possible crimes in Gaza

Mexico and Chile have asked the international criminal court (ICC) to investigate possible crimes against civilians in Gaza.

In a statement, Mexico’s foreign ministry argued that the ICC was the proper forum to establish potential criminal responsibility, “whether committed by agents of the occupying power or the occupied power”. It added:

The action by Mexico and Chile is due to growing worry over the latest escalation of violence, particularly against civilian targets.

Mexico cited “numerous reports from the United Nations that detail many incidents that could constitute crimes under the ICC’s jurisdiction.”

Chile supports “the investigation of any possible war crime ... whether they are war crimes committed by Israelis or by Palestinians,” Chile’s foreign minister, Alberto van Klaveren, told reporters in Santiago.

Any proceedings by the ICC would be separate from South Africa’s case accusing Israel of genocide at the UN’s international court of justice (ICJ).

Israel is not a member of the ICC and does not recognise its jurisdiction.

The UN secretary general, António Guterres, has urged Iran and Pakistan to “exercise maximum restraint to avoid a further escalation of tensions” after an exchange of military strikes between the countries.

Pakistan launched retaliatory strikes against militants in Iran on Thursday in response to attacks by Tehran that targeted sites within Pakistan’s borders.

Stéphane Dujarric, the UN chief’s spokesperson, said in a statement:

The secretary general underlines that all security concerns between the two countries must be addressed by peaceful means, through dialogue and cooperation, in accordance with the principles of sovereignty, territorial integrity, and good neighborly relations.

A UN rights expert has said that Israel has broken international law with its “relentless” bombardment of Gaza that has levelled neighbourhoods and collapsed the territory’s healthcare system.

Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the Palestinian territories, said at a Madrid news conference on Thursday:

Israel has done a number of things that are highly illegal, highly unlawful.

She said that while Israel has the right to self-defence, international humanitarian law must be respected “to protect people who are not actively involved in combat,” AFP reported.

Albanese said she “firmly condemned” the violence carried out by Hamas in Israel – which she said amounted to war crimes and may also be crimes against humanity –but “nothing justifies what Israel has done”. She said:

What has happened is over 100 days of relentless bombing – the first two weeks using 6,000 bombs per week, bombs of 2,000 pounds, in highly crowded area.

Most hospitals in Gaza had been made “dysfunctional”, she said, adding that most Palestinians are dying now “not because of the bombs but because there is not sufficient infrastructure to cure them of wounds.” Albanese added:

The number of kids who get amputated every day is shocking, one or two limbs. During the first two months of this (war) 1,000 kids were amputated without anaesthesia. It is a monstrosity.

Houthis claim another attack on US ship in Gulf of Aden

The Houthis have claimed they fired “naval missiles” at a US ship, Chem Ranger, in the Gulf of Aden on Thursday.

The attack resulted in “direct hits”, a statement from the Houthi group said, adding:

The Yemeni Armed Forces confirm that a retaliation to the American and British attacks is inevitable, and that any new aggression will not go unpunished.

Here’s some more detail on the reports of an incident earlier today near Aden in Yemen.

The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) said it received a report of an incident 115 nautical miles south-east of Aden.

An update from UKMTO said the master reported an unidentified drone “in close proximity” to a merchant vessel and explosion in the water about 30 metres off the port side.

It said coalition forces were responding, and that the vessel and its crew are safe. The vessel is proceeding to the next port, it said.

British maritime security firm Ambrey said a Marshall Islands-flagged chemical/products tanker reported a “suspicious approach” of drones, 103 miles south-east of Aden. An advisory note reads:

One (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle) UAV dropped into the sea approximately 30 metres aft ... an Indian warship responded to the event.

Here are some of the latest images we have received over the newswires from Gaza, Israel and the occupied West Bank.

Israeli forces have destroyed the main campus of Al-Israa university in the south of Gaza City, the university said.

Footage circulating on social media appeared to show the complex of buildings being blown up in what appeared to be a controlled explosion, engulfing it in smoke. It was unclear when the explosion took place, AP reported.

In a statement, the university said its main building for graduate studies and bachelor’s colleges were destroyed. It said Israeli forces had seized the complex 70 days ago and used it as a base.

The family of the youngest hostage held by Hamas in Gaza gathered in Tel Aviv on Thursday to mark “the saddest birthday in the world”.

Kfir Bibas, who turned one on Thursday, was kidnapped by Hamas militants from the kibbutz Nir Oz in southern Israel alongside his parents, Yarden and Shiri, and his four-year-old brother Ariel. It is not clear whether Kfir and his family are still alive.

A large crowd filled the Hostages Square in the Israeli capital, many holding orange balloons in acknowledgment of Kfir’s red hair, the Jerusalem Post reported. Near them a large screen displayed the number of days the hostages have been held in Gaza – 103.

Shiri Bibas’ cousin, Yifat Zeiler, said at the ceremony:

No abductee should celebrate a birthday in captivity. We thank the children and their families for such a moving gesture, and ask the decision-makers to read these wishes to understand that behind every hostage there is a whole world.

Here’s our video report:

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