{"id":302675,"date":"2024-10-23T15:32:38","date_gmt":"2024-10-23T19:32:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/?post_type=document&#038;p=302675"},"modified":"2024-11-01T15:32:57","modified_gmt":"2024-11-01T19:32:57","slug":"daily-press-briefing-sg-office-23oct24","status":"publish","type":"document","link":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/document\/daily-press-briefing-sg-office-23oct24\/","title":{"rendered":"Polio vaccination campaign in North Gaza postponed due to escalation of violence, UN Report highlights Palestinian women&#8217;s challenges in Gaza conflict &#8211; Daily Press Briefing by the Office of the Spokesperson for the Secretary-General \u2013 23 October 2024"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div class=\"video-shortcode\"><iframe title=\"T\u00fcrkiye, Lebanon\/Israel, Yemen &amp; other topics - Daily Press Briefing (23 Oct 2024) | Â鶹APP\" width=\"1320\" height=\"743\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/kJXrMLA8PBg?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong><em>(Excerpt)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The following is a near-verbatim transcript of today\u2019s noon briefing by Farhan Haq, Deputy Spokesman for the Secretary-General.<\/p>\n<p>Good morning, everyone.<\/p>\n<p>\/&#8230;<\/p>\n<h2><strong><u>Occupied Palestinian Territory<\/u><\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Turning to the situation in Gaza, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) warns that Palestinians in North Gaza Governorate are experiencing extreme suffering as the Israeli siege there continues.\u00a0 OCHA says there are harrowing levels of death, injury and destruction in the north.\u00a0Civilians are trapped under rubble.\u00a0The sick and wounded are going without life-saving healthcare.\u00a0 Families lack food.\u00a0 Their homes have been destroyed.\u00a0 They have no shelter.\u00a0 And nowhere is safe.<\/p>\n<p>International humanitarian law demands that civilians have the essentials they need to survive \u2014 that\u2019s food, shelter, medical care, and other critical assistance.\u00a0 OCHA appeals once again for rapid, unimpeded humanitarian relief \u2014 which must reach civilians in need.<\/p>\n<p>Our partners on the ground report that two water stations in North Gaza have stopped operating due to the lack of fuel.\u00a0 The suspension of service is affecting large areas, including the neighbourhoods of Al-Daraj, Al-Tuffah, Al-Zarga and Sheikh Radwan.\u00a0 A request earlier this week to deliver 23,000\u00a0litres of fuel to North Gaza Governorate was denied by Israeli authorities.\u00a0From 6\u00a0October through yesterday, several attempts to get fuel to Gaza Governorate were also denied.\u00a0 Another mission was impeded and therefore unable to be accomplished.<\/p>\n<p>The UN and our partners have also been compelled to postpone the polio vaccination campaign in northern Gaza due to the escalating violence, intense bombardment, mass displacement orders, and the lack of assured humanitarian pauses across most of the north. \u00a0This final phase of the vaccination effort was supposed to begin today, with the aim of reaching more than 119,000 children across northern Gaza. \u00a0The current conditions \u2014 including ongoing attacks on civilian infrastructure \u2014 continue to jeopardize people\u2019s safety and movement in northern Gaza, making it impossible for families to safely bring their children for vaccination, and for health workers to operate.<\/p>\n<p>It is imperative to stop the polio outbreak in Gaza, before more children are paralyzed and the virus spreads.\u00a0 To interrupt transmission, at least 90\u00a0per\u00a0cent of all children in every community and neighbourhood must be vaccinated.\u00a0 The vaccination campaign must be facilitated in the north through the implementation of humanitarian pauses.<\/p>\n<p>Our humanitarian partners say that all logistics, supplies and trained personnel were prepared to vaccinate children across the north with their second dose of the polio vaccine.\u00a0 However, given that the area currently approved for temporary humanitarian pauses was substantially reduced in geographic size from the previous round of the vaccination campaign \u2014 and is now limited only to Gaza City \u2014 many children in northern Gaza would have missed out on a second dose.<\/p>\n<p>We and our humanitarian partners continue our efforts to get assistance to people in northern Gaza.\u00a0 On 15\u00a0October, the World Food Programme\u00a0(WFP) was able to deliver one convoy into Gaza City.\u00a0 However, the Israeli siege on North Gaza Governorate has prevented the agency from reaching people there for the past three weeks.\u00a0 WFP warns that September and October saw some of the lowest levels of humanitarian aid entering Gaza since late 2023, alongside a drastic reduction in commercial cargo.<\/p>\n<p>In October, to date, only 20\u00a0per\u00a0cent of the agency\u2019s operational food needs have entered Gaza.\u00a0 A drastic shortage of supplies across Gaza has almost halted general food distribution.\u00a0 WFP says very limited aid supplies have entered the south due to insecurity at the Kerem Shalom crossing point.\u00a0 There is a critical need for a safe and enabling environment for humanitarian operations and convoy movements into and within Gaza.<\/p>\n<p>\/&#8230;<\/p>\n<h2><strong><u>Women, Peace and Security<\/u><\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>The latest report of the Secretary-General on women, peace and security was released yesterday evening.\u00a0 The report says that the effects of war and conflict on women and girls are worsening.\u00a0 Last year, the proportion of women killed in armed conflicts doubled compared to 2022 and four out of every ten people who died because of conflict in 2023 were women.\u00a0The report also says that UN-verified cases of conflict-related sexual violence increased by 50\u00a0per\u00a0cent.<\/p>\n<p>These increases in deaths and violence against women are taking place against a backdrop of increasingly blatant disregard of international law designed to protect women and children during war.\u00a0 The report, which was led by UN-Women, says that every day, 500\u00a0women and girls in conflict-affected countries die from complications related to pregnancy and childbirth.\u00a0 By the end of 2023, 180\u00a0women were giving birth every day in Gaza \u2014 most without necessities or medical care.<\/p>\n<p>\/&#8230;<\/p>\n<h2><strong><u>Questions and Answers<\/u><\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><u>Question<\/u>:\u00a0 Thank you.\u00a0 Thank you, Farhan.\u00a0 There are very few journalists left in Gaza, particularly in the north.\u00a0 How important is it that those journalists in the north of Gaza continue to be able to do their job to document what is happening there and who is responsible for their safety?<\/p>\n<p><u>Deputy Spokesman<\/u>:\u00a0It\u2019s crucially important for journalists to be able to do their job everywhere, including in Gaza.\u00a0 We\u2019ve seen over the past year a very large number of journalists, along with others such as medical professionals, humanitarian workers and our own UNRWA staff, face violence and be killed in alarmingly high numbers.\u00a0 They need to be protected by all of the fighting forces on the ground.\u00a0 And, of course, given the killings of the last year, we call on Israel and Hamas to make sure that reporters are spared.<\/p>\n<p><u>Question<\/u>:\u00a0 Farhan, in late January, the Secretary-General called on Israel to take all measures within its power to prevent acts of genocide within the scope of Article\u00a02 of the Genocide Convention.\u00a0 That\u2019s what the Secretary-General said in late January.\u00a0 Nearly 11\u00a0months later, does the Secretary-General think Israel has done that?<\/p>\n<p><u>Deputy Spokesman<\/u>:\u00a0He continues to have the same call as he did before.\u00a0 And obviously the fact that the fighting goes on is a matter of concern.\u00a0 Dezhi?<\/p>\n<p><u>Question<\/u>:\u00a0 A follow-up on the situation in north Gaza.\u00a0 We just saw this video that IDF gathering civilians to make them leave.\u00a0 Here is what the IDF and Israel, they described this.\u00a0 They said they allow civilians to leave Jabalya in a very safe manner.\u00a0 Do you think this tank with gunpoint or the civilians leaving Jabalya is like an orderly, safely manner or is that just forced displacing?<\/p>\n<p><u>Deputy Spokesman<\/u>:\u00a0We would need more information about exactly how this was carried out.\u00a0 But obviously, we have our concerns to make sure that, in fact, those who are moving are doing so freely and of their own volition and that they have safe places where they can go.<\/p>\n<p><u>Question<\/u>:\u00a0 Do you think they leave there freely and willingly? \u00a0You look at these photos.\u00a0 Do you think those people are queuing up there to leave freely?<\/p>\n<p><u>Deputy Spokesman<\/u>:\u00a0 I\u2019m not going to play the game of judging based on a single photograph.<\/p>\n<p><u>Correspondent<\/u>:\u00a0 Oh, there are lots actually.<\/p>\n<p><u>Deputy Spokesman<\/u>:\u00a0But obviously our colleagues on the ground have expressed their concerns, as I\u2019ve been telling you about regularly, and those concerns continue to apply.\u00a0 Abdelhamid, and then you.<\/p>\n<p><u>Question<\/u>:\u00a0 Thank you, Farhan.\u00a0 Abdullah Hawash is a little boy of 11-year-old.\u00a0 He was throwing a little stone on the Israeli jeep in Nablus, and they responded by a shot in the head and killed him right in front of the camera.\u00a0And if you didn&#8217;t see the video, I will send it to you and to Tor Wennesland also.\u00a0 Do you have any comment on that specific incident?<\/p>\n<p><u>Deputy Spokesman<\/u>: We are certainly\u2026 our hearts go out to the family members of this poor child who was killed, and his killing needs to be thoroughly investigated.<\/p>\n<p>\/&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; &nbsp; (Excerpt) The following is a near-verbatim transcript of today\u2019s noon briefing by Farhan Haq, Deputy Spokesman for the Secretary-General. Good morning, everyone. \/&#8230; Occupied Palestinian Territory Turning to the situation in Gaza, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) warns that Palestinians in North Gaza Governorate are experiencing extreme suffering as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/document\/daily-press-briefing-sg-office-23oct24\/\"> [&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":299,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"country":[],"document-category":[2197,2573,2377,2565,2805],"document-source":[5352],"committee-meeting":[],"document-subject":[2517,1769,2005,2533,1741,1745,1841],"entity":[1729],"document-language":[6542],"class_list":["post-302675","document","type-document","status-publish","hentry","document-category-briefing","document-category-highlights-of-the-noon-briefing","document-category-multimedia","document-category-press-briefing","document-category-video","document-source-secretary-general","document-subject-access-and-movement","document-subject-armed-conflict","document-subject-gaza-strip","document-subject-health","document-subject-human-rights-and-international-humanitarian-law","document-subject-refugees-and-displaced-persons","document-subject-women","entity-united-nations-system","document-language-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document\/302675","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/document"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/299"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document\/302675\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":302685,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document\/302675\/revisions\/302685"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=302675"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"country","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/country?post=302675"},{"taxonomy":"document-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-category?post=302675"},{"taxonomy":"document-source","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-source?post=302675"},{"taxonomy":"committee-meeting","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/committee-meeting?post=302675"},{"taxonomy":"document-subject","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-subject?post=302675"},{"taxonomy":"entity","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/entity?post=302675"},{"taxonomy":"document-language","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-language?post=302675"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}