The UN Security Council held a meeting on Wednesday at the request of Algeria and Slovenia to discuss the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip, as the Zionist war of extermination enters its second year.
The Palestinian News Agency /WAFA/ reported that the Security Council heard a statement from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) and the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA).
Philippe Lazzarini, Commissioner-General of UNRWA, said that Gaza, after a year of profound suffering and loss, has become a completely unrecognizable place and a cemetery for tens of thousands of Palestinians, many of them children, adding that a sea of rubble has replaced the former streets, where almost all residents are now displaced.
He pointed out that the recent Zionist aggression on northern Gaza is particularly worrying, as there is no safe place to go, and that in the south, living conditions have become unbearable while Gaza is once again teeteri
ng on the brink of a man-made famine.
Lazzarini added that after two years of depriving children of education, the Gaza Strip cannot afford to lose an entire generation, which is why the agency has resumed some educational programs alongside its life-saving operations.
He warned of the dire consequences if the Israeli bills to stop UNRWA are adopted, stressing that from a legal standpoint, this legislation defies the will of the international community expressed through General Assembly Resolution 302 on the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), and deepens the violations recognized by the International Court of Justice.
‘Politically, the anti-UNRWA legislation, which is part of a broader campaign to dismantle the agency, seeks to strip Palestinians of their refugee status and unilaterally change the parameters of a future political solution,’ he added, noting that Israeli officials have described the elimination of UNRWA as a war goal.
For her part, Lisa
Dutton, Director of the Financing and Partnerships Division at the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, said that the recent evacuation orders issued by the Israeli occupation forces for large areas of northern Gaza, along with the intensive ground invasions, threaten further death, destruction and mass displacement of civilians.
Dutton added: ‘Once again, a state of absolute chaos prevails as the world watches. The evacuation orders are supposed to be aimed at protecting civilians, but what is happening is the exact opposite. There is no safe place in Gaza.
Source: National Iraqi News Agency