The UN has added the Israeli military to a list of offenders failing to protect children last year, Israel’s ambassador to the UN says.
Erdan described this decision as “shameful,” while Foreign Minister Israel Katz remarked that it would impact Israel’s relations with the UN.
A spokesman for the Palestinian president told the Reuters news agency the decision was a step closer to holding Israel accountable for what he called its crimes.
Thousands of children have lost their lives in Israel’s campaign against Hamas in Gaza, with many more in urgent need of humanitarian aid.
The annual report compiled by the secretary general highlights the casualties among children in conflict zones, the hindrance of aid delivery, and the targeting of educational and medical facilities. This report will be presented to the UN Security Council next week.
It remains uncertain which violations the Israeli army is specifically accused of.
Reports suggest that Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad will also be mentioned in the report.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu criticized the UN’s decision, asserting that the Israeli military maintains the highest moral standards despite the accusations.
Israel launched its offensive after Hamas attacked communities near Gaza on 7 October last year, killing about 1,200 people including 38 children and taking 252 hostages including 42 children, according to Israel’s National Council for the Child.
The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza says 36,731 people have since been killed by Israeli bombardment and ground attacks.
Last month, the UN said at least 7,797 children had been killed during the war based on data relating to identified bodies provided by the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza.
Also last month, the UN revised down the proportion of reported fatalities that were women and children from 69% to 52% of the total number of deaths.
Israel said the reduction showed the UN had relied on false data from Hamas. The UN says it is now relying on figures from the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza rather than from the Hamas-run Government Media Office (GMO). The GMO meanwhile says Israeli attacks have killed more than 15,000 children.
According to an Associated Press news agency examination of data from Gaza’s health ministry, the percentage of Palestinian women and children dying in the Israel-Hamas conflict appears to have dropped significantly, the report claimed on Friday.
According to a specialist at the US non-profit research organization CNA, this is related to the fewer intense Israeli airstrikes.
Meanwhile, Israeli airstrikes on Gaza have continued. It is thought that an attack early on Thursday morning at a significant Gaza school, which was crowded with displaced people, claimed the lives of at least 35 people. The US reported that reports indicated 14 children were killed in the attack. According to Israel, the attack claimed the lives of seventeen Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad fighters.
Doctors Without Borders (MSF), which is assisting the adjacent al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital, sent medical personnel to report chaotic circumstances in the aftermath of the strike. According to the organization, over 300 wounded people—mostly women and children—and at least 70 deceased persons had been brought in during the preceding 24 hours.
An Israeli missile fired last month allegedly killed 45 people, many of them children, and infuriated the entire world by setting fire to a camp for Palestinian refugees close to the southern city of Rafah. According to the Israeli military, they did not anticipate such a fire to start.
Israel has also been accused of delaying the entry of much-needed aid into Gaza, depriving those living on the Palestinian territory of clean water, food, medicines as well as fuel. It denies the accusation and accuses UN bodies and humanitarian organisations of failing to distribute aid that is allowed in.
The US-based famine early warning system network Fews Net says it is “possible, if not likely” that famine was happening in northern Gaza in April and an Israeli military operation in Rafah in southern Gaza was worsening food insecurity there.
Over a million Palestinians have been forced to leave Rafah, where they had sought safety from fighting in other parts of Gaza, and relocate to sandy coastal areas or the mostly destroyed city of Khan Younis as a result of that operation.
According to Unrwa, the UN organization for Palestinian refugees, the large-scale migration that has occurred so quickly combined with a precipitous decline in humanitarian supplies is having fatal effects.
“Children are dying due to malnutrition and dehydration,” Unrwa spokeswoman Juliette Touma said.