«Ssurprisingly, we are still alive.” With these words begins the video testimony of Bisan Odehis, 24 years old, young activist from ActionAid Palestine, from outside Al-Shifa hospital. It is the largest in Gaza and one of 22 in the Strip that were ordered to evacuate by Israeli military forces. Twenty-two hospitals which for many people remain the only safe place to take refuge. On Tuesday the Human Rights Office of the United Nations stated that Israel’s siege of Gaza and its evacuation order could constitute the international crime of forced displacement of civilians.
Gaza, the “impossible” evacuation of hospitals and the lack of water
In the aftermath of the air attack on the al-Ahli Arab hospital which killed at least 500 people, hospitals are not safe places, but to the population they seem to be the only possible ones. The Jewish state has been ordering their evacuation for days. In practice, however, the operation is complicated. Not to say, in fact, impossible.
The ActionAid activist’s testimony from Gaza
“We live and sleep in hospitals, without water, food and hygiene”, says Bisan from Al-Shifa where 35,000 are seeking shelter.
“Before becoming a shelter, this was one of the most important and largest hospitals in the Gaza Strip,” he says. «The conditions here are miserable. People are sleeping and lying on the floor, in the corridors and everywhere inside the hospital.”
Lifting evacuation orders is a priority
The lifting of evacuation orders is a priority, therefore, at this time, along with the need to protect healthcare facilities and healthcare workers in this unprecedented time.
ActionAid, like all humanitarian organizations active in the field, calls for a ceasefire and the creation of a humanitarian corridor safe to provide care and medicines. But also the protection of civil infrastructures and civilians. Hospitals, schools, humanitarian facilities and shelters must be protected from fighting and should neither be occupied by combatants nor deliberately targeted.
A woman clutches a pillow near the Ahli Arab hospital after the air strike that hit it. October 18, 2023 (Photo by MAHMUD HAMS / AFP) (Photo by MAHMUD HAMS/AFP via Getty Images)
UN, the evacuation requested by Israel violates human rights
International law contemplates temporary evacuation of an area on the basis of population safety or imperative military reasons. But only if accompanied by the supply of one adequate accommodation for all displaced people, in satisfactory conditions of hygiene, health, safety and nutrition. “It appears that Israel has made no attempt to ensure this for the 1.1 million civilians (from the Gaza Strip) who have been ordered to move,” said the spokeswoman for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. , Ravina Shamdasani. «We fear that this order, combined with the imposition of a ‘total siege’ on Gaza, cannot be considered a legitimate temporary evacuation, but a violation of international law». In short, the UN is investigating.
The water that is missing throughout Gaza
Meanwhile, water supplies are reaching critical levels across Gaza due to persistent blockades on fuel, water and food. «The situation is critical in particular for pregnant and breastfeeding women (50,000 live in Gaza, of which 5,500 are close to giving birth). Dehydrate they will struggle to produce the milk they need to feed their babies and keep them alive,” explains Soraida Hussein-Sabbah, Gender and Advocacy Specialist for ActionAid.
Access to water, a fundamental human right denied
Currently, only three liters of water is available per person in Gaza. According to theUNRWA (UN Refugee Agency) Water supplies have been restored only in the southern part of Gaza, providing a limited supply to only half the population of the city of Khan Yunis, almost 100,000 people. Water cannot be pumped throughout the Gaza Strip since much of the infrastructure needed to supply water to local communities has been destroyed and damaged during continuous Israeli bombing. The total collapse of sanitation services across Gaza also increases the threat of cholera and diarrheal diseaseswhich are two of the leading causes of death for children under five worldwide.
«Access to water is universally recognized as a fundamental human right, which means that the continued blockade of Gaza represents a denial of the rights of women and children across the area. We urgently call for a humanitarian corridor to Gaza and the full and uninterrupted restoration of water supplies from Israel to Gaza” concludes Soraida.
Running out of fuel supplies will also have a disastrous and unprecedented impact on hospitals, where many patients, including newborns in neonatal units, are on life support.
The children of Gaza: 300 thousand displaced, hundreds killed
In just 11 days, hundreds of children have tragically lost their lives in Gaza and thousands more have been injured, with more than 300,000 children displaced from their homes. And the situation of children has been alarming for years, also from a psychological point of view. As ActionAid, which has been operating in the Occupied Palestinian Territories for many years, knows well, most of the civilians are children and adolescents who they have never known a life without lockdown or experienced a normal childhood. Thousands suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder and depression.
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