Israel/Palästina

The UN's human rights chief has said he is "horrified" by the destruction of Gaza's Nasser and al-Shifa hospitals and the reports of "mass graves" being found at the sites after Israeli raids. Volker Türk called for independent investigations into the deaths.

A new mechanism for getting lifesaving aid into Gaza will start in the coming days, UN Senior Humanitarian and Reconstruction Coordinator Sigrid Kaag announced in a briefing to the Security Council on Wednesday.

Germany said on Wednesday it would resume cooperation with the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), signalling a resumption of funding that was frozen after Israel accused 12 UNRWA staff of participating in the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attack.

An independent panel released its much-awaited report on Monday about the UN relief agency for Palestine refugees (UNRWA), providing 50 recommendations and noting that Israeli authorities have yet to provide proof of their claims that UN staff are involved with terrorist organisations.

The head of the embattled U.N. agency that assists Palestinian refugees said Wednesday that as famine is taking hold across Gaza, the agency is facing an Israeli campaign to push it out of the occupied Palestinian territories and prevent it from carrying out its humanitarian mission. 

Jamie McGoldrick, the UN Humanitarian Coordinator overseeing crisis relief in Gaza, pushed back at Israeli claims that more than 1,000 trucks had entered Gaza in the last few days, but only around 800 had been collected on the Palestinian side. The veteran aid official also maintained that the deconfliction system in which humanitarians shared their coordinates with the warring sides was “consistently inaccurate”.

The United States pressed Hamas on Tuesday to accept a cease-fire deal with Israel that would halt fighting in Gaza for six weeks. It would also release some of the 100 or so hostages held by the U.S.-designated terror group in exchange for Israel freeing hundreds of Palestinians it has jailed.

The President of the UN General Assembly appealed on Monday for “all those with leverage” to use their power to bring an end to the six-month-long war in Gaza. Dennis Francis convened the UN’s most representative body, comprising all 193 Member States, following the Security Council’s failure to adopt a resolution put forward by the United States last month.  

UN-coordinated food convoys are three times more likely to be denied access to north Gaza than other aid convoys, the UN humanitarian affairs office, OCHA, reported on Tuesday.

The UN’s top human rights body adopted a resolution on Friday condemning the alleged “use of starvation of civilians as a method of warfare in Gaza”, while also calling for an arms embargo on Israel.