UNICEF calls for ceasefire, humanitarian corridor in Gaza

UNICEF continues to call for a ceasefire and humanitarian corridor for the provision of critical child survival interventions to avert unnecessary deaths associated with communicable diseases,” the organisation said in a post.

UNICEF says it needs the fighting to stop to protect children after the delivery of 600,000 doses of vaccines.

“Today the situation is unimaginably stressful for children in Gaza. We do not want to see children who survive the bombing to die because they are not vaccinating,” said the organisation’s Maulid Warfa.

Last week, we delivered 600K vaccines to #GazaStrip in cooperation with @WHOoPt & @UNRWA

UNICEF continues to call for a ceasefire & humanitarian corridor for the provision of critical child survival interventions to avert unnecessary deaths associated with communicable diseases pic.twitter.com/qlnNDPP7yd

— UNICEF Palestine (@UNICEFpalestine) January 7, 2024

On October 7, some 1,200 people were killed and 240 were taken hostage, according to Israeli officials. More than 100 hostages are still believed to be held by Hamas.

Israel’s attacks has so far killed 22,835 Palestinians in Gaza, after 111 dead and 250 wounded were added to the tally over the past 24 hours, Palestinian health officials said on Sunday.

An Israeli air strike on a car near Rafah in southern Gaza on Sunday killed two Palestinian journalists, according to health officials in Gaza and the journalists’ union there.

Separately, the health ministry said Israeli drones had opened fire on buildings at the Shuhada Al-Aqsa hospital in the central Gaza Strip.

There were no reports of injuries but ministry spokesman Ashraf Al-Qidra accused Israel of trying to undermine work at the hospital, which serves hundred of thousands of Palestinians in central Gaza – the focus of a heavier Israeli ground and air offensive in the past two weeks.

The fighting has displaced most of Gaza’s 2.3 million population, with many homes and civilian infrastructure left in ruins amid acute shortages of food, water and medicine.