ActionAid said:
“People in Gaza have yet again woken to scenes of horror. Israeli military airstrikes have killed hundreds of people, including many women, children and elderly people. Hospitals – which have not received any vital medical supplies or fuel for 17 days – are overwhelmed and struggling to cope with the huge influx of injured patients. Our staff and partners in Gaza report fear and panic on the streets. Terrified families, who have only just recently returned to the piles of rubble that are their homes, now face being forced to flee yet again as new displacement orders are issued.
This outrageous return to mass attacks by the Israeli military comes as people in Gaza were still reeling after 18 months of war, and running out of food, water and other essentials amid a total blockade on aid. How much more horror must they endure? The international community cannot stand by while Palestinians in Gaza are killed in their hundreds: all efforts must turn towards urging all parties to respect the ceasefire agreement and implement their commitments in full. The bombing must stop, permanently, and aid must be allowed to flow into Gaza unhindered before any more lives are needlessly lost.”
Amjad Al Shawa, director of the Palestinian NGOs Network (PNGO) – an umbrella organization of 30 Palestinian NGOs and a partner of ActionAid Palestine – who is based in Gaza, said:
“In less than 10 hours of the Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip, more than 400 people were killed, most of them children, women, elders. These children, who were sleeping in their beds, were killed. Tents were attacked. Entire families were razed from the records.
These attacks happened while Gaza is under a tight blockade. For [17] days, Israel denied the entry of all the humanitarian supplies–medical, food, water supplies–to the Gaza Strip.
The hospitals are full of hundreds of injured who are in the corridors in very critical situations. And we are warning of the coming hours that, if this will continue, there will be more catastrophic conditions.
We are calling on all actors to intervene to stop such attacks on Palestinian civilians, and to end the suffering, to reopen the crossings to enter the needed supplies to the Palestinians, and to sustain the ceasefire.”
ENDS
For media requests, please email christal.james@actionaid.org or call 7046659743.
About ActionAid
ActionAid is a global federation working with more than 41 million people living in more than 71 countries, including some of the world’s poorest countries. We want to see a just, fair, and sustainable world in which everybody enjoys the right to a life of dignity and freedom from poverty and oppression. We work to achieve social justice and gender equality and to eradicate poverty, including by shifting power to local organizations and movements.
