Three employees of the Palestinian Red Crescent have been killed in Gaza in the last three days.
This was announced by the Red Cross on Friday evening.
– What we know is that two employees and a volunteer have been killed while performing life-saving work, associated with the Red Crescent hospital in Gaza.
This is what Øistein Mjærum, director of communications at the Red Cross, tells NRK.
They join a grim statistic of aid workers killed. Since the war started on 7 October, 14 employees and volunteers from the Red Cross network have been killed.
– We are starting to run out of words to describe the desperate situation, says Mjærum.
At the same time, he is full of admiration for the health personnel who are still in Gaza.
– For all the people who, at the risk of their own lives, do what they can to help the residents of Gaza.
From Khan Younis to Rafah
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant claimed on Thursday that Israel has defeated Hamas in Khan Younis.
During a visit to Israeli forces in Khan Younis, he said that Israeli forces will move on towards Rafah, in the very south of Gaza.
– They don’t have weapons, they don’t have ammunition. They have 10,000 terrorists killed and 10,000 other terrorists wounded. Hamas has suffered a severe blow and is weakened, Gallant said.
According to the UN organization UNRWA, up to 1.7 million people in Gaza are refugees in their own country.
Over half will be in Rafah.
It is not only Israeli forces moving south from Khan Younis. So do Palestinian refugees, who are trying to get away from the worst of the fighting.
Photo: Mahmud Hams / AFP
Uses old infection suits
Pictures from Rafah on Friday show a desperate situation among the Palestinians.
In several places, both children and adults can be seen walking around in white protective suits.
Not to protect oneself from infection, but to keep warm.
Protective suits from the corona pandemic have been given a new purpose in Gaza. Now they are used to keep warm.
Photo: Mahmud Hams / AFP
Jens Lærke from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) describes the situation in Rafah as “a pressure cooker of despair”.
According to Palestinian health authorities, over 27,000 people have been killed in Israeli attacks since October, 70 percent of them women and children.
In several places, children and adults have to wade through deep puddles to get food.
Rainwear is a rarity in Rafah. Instead, children and adults have to resort to other solutions to keep the rain away.
And prams can be used to transport drinking water, not just people.
Flees for the eighth time
More and more Palestinians are now in Rafah. They flee there, trying to get away from the worst of the fighting.
Two employees from the Norwegian Red Cross are also in Rafah. They have told about a family that is now on the run for the tenth time since the war started; another family for the eighth time.
– Now there are no safe places left to flee. At the start, they could flee to the south to slightly safer places, now it is not safe in the south, says Mjærum.
The Red Cross employees also tell of increasing desperation and fear among the population.
– This means that there is a very tense situation in Gaza now. It doesn’t take long before there are riots and conflict over food, says Mjærum in the Red Cross.
They also describe increased fighting around the hospitals in Gaza, which means that patients do not reach the hospitals.
– The ambulances are also not allowed to go out and pick up the injured, because of the bombardment that is now taking place, says Mjærum.
2024-02-02 19:38:26
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