Israel turning Gaza into ‘graveyard of children and starving’: UNRWA chief

Israel is engineering a “cruel and Machiavellian strategy to kill” successful Gaza, the caput of the United Nations bureau for Palestine refugees says, arsenic the satellite assemblage reports that since May, immoderate 800 Palestinians person been killed portion seeking aid.

“Under our watch, Gaza has go the graveyard of children [and] starving people,” UNRWA main Philippe Lazzarini said successful a station connected X connected Friday.

People successful Gaza person “no mode out”, helium said. “Their prime is betwixt 2 deaths: starvation oregon being [shot] at.”

Lazzarini was reacting to the Israeli military’s sidesplitting of 15 people, including 9 children and 4 women, arsenic they waited successful enactment for nutritional supplements successful the metropolis of Deir el-Balah successful cardinal Gaza connected Thursday.

Inaction & soundlessness are complicities.
Under our watch, #Gaza has go the graveyard of children & starving people.

No mode out. Their prime is betwixt 2 deaths: starvation oregon being sprout at.

The astir cruel & machiavellian strategy to kill, successful full impunity.

Our norms & values… https://t.co/oWQYXSn1fb

— Philippe Lazzarini (@UNLazzarini) July 11, 2025

His comments came connected different bloody day successful the Strip, with aesculapian sources reporting that 31 radical had been killed – 10 of them adjacent a GHF-run assistance centre successful Rafah.

The arguable US- and Israel-backed GHF has efficaciously sidelined Gaza’s immense UN-led assistance transportation web since it started operations successful May, aft Israel eased a much than two-month full blockade connected the Strip.

Since then, 819 Palestinians person been killed portion waiting for food, the spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said connected Friday. He said 634 were killed successful the vicinity of GHF sites – which fig 4 for the full enclave – and 185 were killed adjacent to different humanitarian assistance convoys, including immoderate tally by the UN.

Earlier successful the day, Ravina Shamdasani, spokesperson for the UN quality rights office, said betwixt May and July 7, the UN had recorded 798 killings adjacent assistance points successful Gaza.

Israeli soldiers and US contractors moving with GHF person admitted to shooting unarmed Palestinians gathering for food, according to abstracted caller reports by Israeli outlet Haaretz and The Associated Press quality agency.

Reporting from the UN successful New York, Al Jazeera’s Gabriel Elizondo said that Carl Skau, lawman enforcement manager of the World Food Programme (WFP), had fixed a briefing successful which helium reported the concern successful Gaza was “the worst that helium has ever seen it”.

Skau, who had conscionable returned from his 4th travel to Gaza, had said the WFP had capable nutrient to provender the full colonisation of Gaza for 2 months, but the trucks were not being fto in.

Instead, Palestinians successful Gaza person been forced to trust connected the GHF.

‘A 2nd Nakba’

The grade of the sidesplitting astatine the GHF sites emerged arsenic Israel precocious its plans for what it calls a “humanitarian city” – likened by analysts to a concentration camp – to beryllium built connected the ruins of the confederate metropolis of Rafah.

Satellite images analysed by Al Jazeera amusement ample tracts of onshore successful Rafah being cleared of buildings, seemingly successful mentation for the forced transportation of Palestinians.

Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz had told journalists this week that the portion would yet location Gaza’s full colonisation of 2.1 million.

British Israeli expert Daniel Levy, president of the US/Middle East Project, noted that the 3 GHF assistance hubs located successful the southbound were an integral portion of a program to bait Palestinians into moving towards Rafah.

“The positioning of these GHF organisation sites is simply a premeditated portion of a program of social-demographic engineering to determination Palestinians – to relocate, displace and kettle them – into this country successful the south,” helium told Al Jazeera.

Rafah, helium said, was being utilized arsenic a “staging post” to “ethnically cleanse” Palestinians from the remainder of Gaza. “We are witnessing, it seems, a 2nd Nakba,” helium said.

The GHF, for its part, boasted connected Friday that it was “reinventing” assistance delivery. “Our unafraid and innovative channels mean assistance is placed straight into the hands of those who desperately request it,” the radical said connected X.

‘On the brink of decease each day’

As of Friday evening, 31 radical – including the 10 slain astatine the GHF tract successful Rafah – had been killed successful the enclave since dawn, according to aesculapian sources who spoke to Al Jazeera.

Among those killed, astatine slightest 8 radical died aft Israel bombed the Halimah al-Saadiyah School successful Jabalia an-Nazla, which was sheltering the displaced. The subject struck astatine nighttime arsenic radical slept.

Witness Ahmed Khalla told Al Jazeera helium recovered dormant radical lying connected the level of a classroom, coming upon scenes helium described arsenic “beyond horrific”, including “a small miss without a caput – literally, without a head”.

At slightest 1 Palestinian was killed and others were wounded pursuing an Israeli onslaught that targeted a location connected Jaffa Street successful the Tuffah area, eastbound of Gaza City. Sources astatine al-Ahli Arab Hospital told Al Jazeera that the unfortunate was a child.

Gaza’s Health Ministry said successful a connection that patients successful the enclave’s hospitals “continue to beryllium placed connected the brink of decease each day” owed to a deficiency of fuel.

It said that arsenic hospitals are forced to ration fuel, this leads to cutting disconnected energy successful immoderate departments and halting immoderate services, including kidney dialysis treatments.

“It besides reduces the quality to run a capable fig of ambulances, forcing citizens to transport the injured and sick successful animal-drawn carts,” said the statement.

Israeli restrictions connected humanitarian assistance entree into Gaza are placing countless lives astatine risk, Stephane Dujarric, the spokesperson for the UN’s Guterres, said.

“Such denials are life-threatening,” helium said during a quality conference, stressing that “every time without a ceasefire brings much preventable deaths successful Gaza, children dying successful pain, and bare radical changeable portion trying to scope the trickle of assistance allowed” by Israel.