UN humanitarian chief says essential supplies are ‘running out’ in Gaza
The top UN humanitarian official is accusing Israel of blocking the delivery of desperately needed aid to Gaza, saying there is barely any food left in the north where an Israeli offensive is underway, AP reports.
Acting humanitarian chief Joyce Msuya told an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council today that no food entered northern Gaza from 2 October to 15 October, “when a trickle was allowed in.”
“All essential supplies for survival are running out,” she said. “There is now barely any food left to distribute, and most bakeries will be forced to shut down again in the next several days without additional fuel.”
Throughout Gaza, Msuya said, less than one third of the 286 humanitarian missions coordinated with Israeli authorities in the first two weeks of October “were facilitated without major incidents or delays.”
She said the level of suffering and reality in Gaza is brutal and worsens every day as Israeli bombs fall, fierce fighting continues and “supplies essential for people’s survival and humanitarian assistance are blocked at every turn.”
Msuya urged all Security Council members to ensure that international humanitarian law is respected. It requires that civilians are protected and receive supplies to meet their essential needs wherever they are.
Key events
Qatar’s prime minister, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, said that there have been no conversations with any parties on a Gaza ceasefire for the last three to four weeks, Reuters reports.
Speaking at the European Union-Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) summit in Brussels, Sheikh Mohammed said:
On the prospects of the negotiation … basically in the last three to four weeks, there is no conversation or engagement at all, and we are just moving in the same circle with the silence from all parties.
Flattened buildings and streets lined with piles of rubble and debris can be seen in footage of the aftermath of Israeli airstrikes on the town in southern Lebanon that killed at least 15 people:
The global non-profit charity ActionAid has released the following statement from its Beirut-based regional campaigns coordinator, Sabine Abiaad:
We are living in constant fear, unsure when the next attack might happen, leading to anxiety and depression. I am in my forties, and I’ve lived through every phase of war in Lebanon. Now, I find myself facing a painful déjà vu as my daughter, a teenager, and my 12-year-old son ask me the same questions I used to ask my own mother: ‘Are we going to survive? Will we be targeted? Are we going to be killed?’ Old traumas come flooding back, and the child in me, who lived through the earlier conflict in Beirut, is still afraid. I try to reassure them, telling them we should be grateful because we still have our home. But the threat is everywhere – it hangs over our heads, day and night, like a constant, invisible weight that never lets us feel truly safe.
Conflict and the psychological pressure disrupt every aspect of our daily life, leaving us in a constant struggle to adapt to unpredictable conditions, uncertainty and creating a constant state of mental fatigue.
More than 2,300 people have been killed by Israeli airstrikes across Lebanon since Israel launched its attacks on the country several weeks ago. An additional 1.2 million people have been forcibly displaced across the country as the World Health Organization warns of a growing cholera risk.
Nineteen-year-old Palestinian burned to death in Israeli airstrike would have turned 20 today
Shaban al-Dalou, the 19-year-old Palestinian who was burned to death in his makeshift tent when Israel bombed the al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital complex in Deir el-Balah on Monday, would have turned 20 today.
In a new report for Drop Site News, Gaza-based journalist Abubaker Abed spoke to al-Dalou’s family about their son.
“His life was only work during the war. He would get up in the early morning, bring all the necessities for his family, and buy all the needs for the makeshift falafel stall. He was his family’s heart and hope. If he ever wanted to find some respite, he would relax and swim in the sea for one hour or so and then come back immediately for work,” al-Dalou’s cousin said.
Al-Dalou, who was a student at Gaza’s al-Azhar University, which Israel destroyed, would have turned 20 today. Abed reports that al-Dalou had been applying to universities in Qatar, Ireland and the UK before he was burned to death in the Israeli airstrike – with his IV still connected to him. Al-Dalou had survived a previous Israeli airstrike on a mosque on 6 October and had spent hours each day studying in his tent while recovering from his injuries.
“Losing him is an incredibly massive loss,” al-Dalou’s uncle, Mohammed al-Dalou said, adding: “He left a mountain of pain and memories.”
Hezbollah said it has fired rockets at the Israeli town of Safed, Reuters reports.
In a statement released on Wednesday, Hezbollah said that it targeted “at 6.50pm (1550 GMT) … the occupied town of Safed with a salvo of rockets” in “defense of Lebanon and its people”.
The reported attack marks the third attack in 24 hours which Hezbollah said was a response to Israeli raids across Lebanon which have killed more than 2,000 people in recent weeks.
As well as warning about the risk of cholera spreading in Lebanon after a case was identified there, the WHO urged Israel to ensure the necessary conditions to finish the job of vaccinating Gaza’s children against polio, after reaching more than 150,000 with the required second dose.
Despite continuing Israeli military operations in the territory, the second round of a polio vaccination campaign, aiming to reach more than 590,000 children under the age of 10, got under way on Monday.
“The total number of children who received a second dose of polio vaccine in central Gaza after two days of vaccination is 156,943,” WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on X along with a video showing the WHO’s vaccination efforts. “The vaccination continues today. At the same time, 128,121 children received vitamin A supplements.
“We call for the humanitarian pauses to continue to be respected. We call for a ceasefire and peace,” he said.
The total number of children who received a second dose of #polio vaccine in central #Gaza after two days of vaccination is 156,943. The vaccination continues today.
At the same time, 128,121 children received vitamin A supplements.
We call for the humanitarian pauses to… pic.twitter.com/TCWqYF13vn
— Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (@DrTedros) October 16, 2024
Hezbollah said it fired rockets at the northern Israeli town of Safed today, the third such attack in 24 hours which the Lebanese armed group described as a response to Israeli raids, AFP reports.
Militants from the Iran-backed group targeted “at 6:50 pm (1550 GMT)… the occupied town of Safed with a salvo of rockets” in “defence of Lebanon and its people,” Hezbollah said in a statement.
WHO: cholera case confirmed in Lebanon, risk of spread ‘very high’
The risk of cholera spreading in Lebanon is “very high”, the World Health Organization has warned, after a case of the acute and potentially deadly infection was detected in the conflict-hit country, AFP reports.
The WHO highlighted the risk of cholera spreading among hundreds of thousands of people displaced since Israel escalated its campaign against Hezbollah.
“If the cholera outbreak … spreads to the new displaced people, it might spread very fast,” Abdinasir Abubakar, WHO’s representative in Lebanon, told reporters at an online news conference.
Lebanon’s health ministry said a cholera case had been confirmed in a Lebanese national who went to hospital on Monday. The patient, from Ammouniyeh in northern Lebanon, had no history of travel, the ministry said.
Lebanon suffered its first cholera outbreak in 30 years between 2022 and 2023, mainly in the north of the country. The disease, which causes severe diarrhoea, vomiting and muscle cramps, generally arises from eating or drinking food or water that is contaminated with the bacterium, according to the WHO.
The UN health agency has for months been warning that the disease could resurface amid “deteriorating water and sanitation” among the displaced and their host communities, Abubakar said.
US tells Israel is opposes daily strikes on Beirut
The US has told Israel it opposes near-daily strikes in densely populated Beirut and it was crucial that Israeli operations be conducted in a way that does not threaten civilian lives, Reuters reports.
The comments by spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre at a daily press briefing come as more strikes continue in Beirut. The State Department said yesterday it opposed the strikes.
An Israeli strike on a municipality building in the southern Lebanese town of Nabatieh earlier today killed 16 people and wounded 52, the Lebanese health ministry said, giving a final toll.
The Lebanese prime minister Najib Mikati earlier condemned the deadly Israeli strikes, saying they intentionally targeted a municipality meeting.