Six UN health workers die in Israeli airstrikes on school in Gaza Strip

HQ Team

September 12, 2024: Six staff members working for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian refugees were killed in Gaza during Israeli airstrikes on a school-turned-shelter.

“This is the highest death toll among our staff in a single incident,” according to an UNRWA statement. “Among those killed was the manager of the UNRWA shelter and other team members assisting displaced people.”

The school in Nuseirat, home to about 12,000 people — mainly displaced women and children — has been hit five times since the war began.

At least 34 people were killed in the strikes, the UN stated, quoting media reports. The school in Nuseirat is located in the Middle Area of the Gaza Strip.

UN Secretary-General António Guterres slammed the bloodshed.

“What’s happening in Gaza is unacceptable,” he wrote on X. “These dramatic violations of international humanitarian law need to stop now.”

‘No one is spared’

Earlier this week the UN had said the site had been previously deconflicted with the Israeli forces. UNRWA called on all parties involved in the conflict to never use schools or the areas around them for military or fighting purposes.

“No one is safe in Gaza. No one is spared. Schools and other civilian infrastructure must be protected at all times, they are not a target,” according to the statement.

UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini said the “endless and senseless killing, day after day” in Gaza had claimed the lives of at least 220 agency staff since the war began.

“Humanitarian staff, premises and operations have been blatantly and unabatedly disregarded since the beginning of the war,” he said, warning that “the longer impunity prevails, the more international humanitarian law and the Geneva Conventions will become irrelevant.”

Since the war in Gaza began on October 7, 2023, 85% of school buildings in Gaza have been hit or damaged. Schools have gone from safe havens of education for children living under blockade to overcrowded shelters, becoming places of death and misery, the UN stated.

More than 625,000 students have been out of learning since the war began, half of them were going to UNRWA schools.

School hallways, classrooms and wards are so overcrowded that you can no longer see the floor, with multiple families surviving every day sharing the same space, according to the UN statement.

Many sleep on the ground, and the number of bathrooms and showers is insufficient. Older people sleep in stairwells, mothers try to settle their newborn babies in classrooms, and children missing limbs try to navigate their way through endless makeshift shelters.

10-day security operation

The UN and its partners continued to support Palestinian civilians in the West Bank who have been affected by the 10-day Israeli security operation in Jenin and Tulkarm, as well as adjacent refugee camps.

This includes delivery of food and water, with the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs coordinating efforts to provide additional assistance.

Over the weekend, the Office along with UNRWA and other humanitarian partners began assessing the needs of Palestinians affected by the operation.

More than 620 people, over a third of them children, remain displaced, and some 2,400 housing units have been damaged, with more than 100 rendered uninhabitable.

During the operation, more than 2.6 kilometres of water and sewage networks in the Tulkarm and Nur Shams refugee camps were bulldozed, severely hindering the delivery of essential services. More than 33,000 residents have been coping with water cuts and sewage flooding over the past two weeks.

Polio vaccination

Health workers continued efforts to vaccinate young children in northern Gaza against polio, part of a wider campaign to defeat the disease, which can cause paralysis, according to the UN.

More than 81,600 boys and girls were vaccinated as of Tuesday, according to preliminary data from the World Health Organization.

Polio was detected in Gaza in June and UN agencies and partners launched a two-round campaign this month to provide over 640,000 children with two doses of novel oral polio vaccine type 2.

So far, nearly 528,000 children have been reached in the first round.