GENEVA (Palestine Foundation Information Center) The UN has accused Israeli forces of “systematically” blocking access to people in need in Gaza, complicating the task of delivering aid in what has become a lawless war zone.
It has become nearly impossible to carry out medical evacuations and aid deliveries in northern Gaza and increasingly difficult in the south, Jens Laerke, the spokesperson for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), told journalists on Tuesday.
All planned aid convoys into the north have been denied by Israeli authorities in recent weeks, with the last allowed in on January 23, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
Making matters worse, even convoys cleared in advance with Israeli authorities have repeatedly been blocked or come under fire, according to Laerke.
Laerke pointed to an incident last Sunday when a convoy, jointly organized by the WHO and the Palestinian Red Crescent, to evacuate patients from the besieged Al Amal hospital in the southern city of Khan Yunis, was blocked for hours and paramedics detained.
Laerke said that the medical convoy was transporting 24 patients, including one pregnant woman and one mother and newborn, from Al Amal Hospital in Khan Yunis.
“Despite prior coordination for all staff members and vehicles with the Israeli side, the Israeli forces blocked the WHO-led convoy for many hours the moment it left the hospital,” Laerke said. “We were forced to leave 31 noncritical patients” in the hospital.
“The Israeli military forced patients and staff out of ambulances and stripped all paramedics of their clothes,” he said, noting that three Red Crescent paramedics were detained while the rest of the convoy stayed in place for more than seven hours.
He added that one paramedic has since been released.
“We appeal for the immediate release of the other two and all other detained health workers,” Laerke said.
“We have not had any information or any communication from Israeli authorities as to why this clearly notified movement — which they, by the way, acknowledged that we had sent them notification — was still detained for seven hours,” he said.
Laerke said Israeli authorities also have not explained why “health workers were taken out, forced to undress, and three held back — two of them still not released.”
“The 24 evacuated patients were transported from Al Amal to a hospital in Rafah, where they could receive treatment,” Laerke said. “And several, if not all of them, required some kind of surgical intervention, which of course could not happen at Al Amal Hospital.”
“Al Amal Hospital has been at the epicenter of [Israeli] military operations in Khan Yunis for more than a month,” Laerke pointed out.
He also noted that Sunday was not an isolated incident. He said eight convoys have come under fire and were systematically denied access to people in need.
“Humanitarian workers have been harassed, intimidated or detained by Israeli forces, and humanitarian infrastructure has been hit,” he said.
“Just prior to Sunday’s incident, two family members of Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders) were killed in an unprompted attack by Israeli forces against a deconflicted compound where their staff and family members slept,” the OCHA spokemsman said.
WHO affirms that 40 Israeli attacks on Al Amal Hospital from January 22 to February 22 killed at least 25 people and left the facility incapacitated.
Currently, 215 people remain in the hospital, including the 31 patients left behind, health workers, paramedics, ambulance drivers, eight physicians and 10 nurses, according to WHO.
