Gaza: Continued displacement, running out of shelter materials and high malnutrition rates

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said that hostilities across the Gaza Strip continue to have devastating effects on civilians, including death, displacement, and destruction of critical infrastructure. UN humanitarian partners estimate that some five hundred thousand people have been newly displaced since today, in addition to the hundreds of thousands who were repeatedly displaced before the ceasefire. Aid workers said tents were no longer available for distribution across the Strip. In the town of Bani Suheila in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, for example, recently displaced families received only a few blankets and tarpaulins. Last week, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) visited displacement sites in Khan Younis and reported that the majority of people were living in overcrowded shelters with scarce shelter, food, water and medicine. United Nations partners reported an increase in acute malnutrition in the Strip, and a decrease in the number of children receiving supplementary feeding in March, by more than two thirds.

Restrictions on humanitarian access hamper the ability to supply hospitals with medical supplies, putting the health of more patients at risk. Aid workers are facing increasing difficulties in working because humanitarian aid has not entered the Strip for seven weeks, as military operations expand.

The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs stated that the Israeli authorities continued to refuse to approve coordinated missions. Today, it facilitated only two of the six humanitarian movements that had been planned and coordinated with the Israeli authorities.