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‘Collective Failure of Humanity’: Nearly 118 Million Refugees Violently Displaced Worldwide
The number of people who were forcibly displaced at the end of last year dropped from 2024 levels, but that change was largely driven by people who were forced to return home, sometimes to precarious conditions.
Jun 11, 2026
The number of people forcibly displaced around the world fell last year for the first time in years, dropping by more than 5 million—but with that trend driven in part by countries that have forced refugees to return home, often to precarious or dangerous conditions, advocacy groups warned that the world's refugee and displacement crises are far from being solved.
At the end of last year, 117.8 million people were forcibly displaced around the world, according to data released Thursday by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). That number includes 41.6 million refugees, 9 million asylum-seekers, and 68.7 million internally displaced people.
While the number of displaced people fell from 123.2 million in 2024, the UNHCR emphasized that the change reflected "a sharp increase in the returns of refugees, mostly to Afghanistan, Syria, and Sudan."
"Many of the returns occurred under adverse circumstances and the reintegration conditions remain extremely challenging," said the agency.
Jan Egeland, secretary general of the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), said that "in Afghanistan, millions were forcibly returned from neighboring Pakistan and Iran, and in [the Democratic Republic of] Congo some displacement camps were evacuated at gunpoint, sending thousands of families back to homes that no longer exist."
Of 2.9 million Afghans who were no longer considered forcibly displaced last year, most of their returns to their home country were "involuntary in nature due to changes in the policies of host countries."
In the US, the Trump administration last year terminated Temporary Protected Status for Afghan nationals, between 9,500 and 11,700 of whom were legally residing in the US. Hundreds of thousands of Afghans were deported from Iran, Pakistan, and Tajikistan last year.
"The first fall in global displacement in over a decade should be good news. Instead, it reflects misery on a historic scale," said David Milliband, president of the International Rescue Committee. "These numbers tell a story of both forced returns and forced displacement. People are returning to countries mired in crisis, most with no choice, with every route to safety collapsed around them."
The number of refugees who were successfully resettled dropped precipitously last year along with the number of people who were classified as displaced. Just 81,800 people found new homes through resettlement programs or sponsorship pathways, representing a year-on-year drop of more than half.
The top countries that continued to host refugees last year were Colombia, Turkey, and Germany, and more than 70% of refugees came from just six countries: Afghanistan, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, Ukraine, and Venezuela.
Egeland emphasized that while the number of forcibly displaced people fell last year, "the number of people who have fled their home because of violence and conflict has nearly tripled over the last 15 years."
"The 117.8 million people now violently displaced around the globe would constitute the world’s 13th-largest country by population. Larger than Egypt, Germany, or the UK. A human toll of vast proportions, and a collective failure of humanity," said Egeland.
The numbers released by UNHCR indicated that while millions "continued to be uprooted" last year, "many more endured protracted crises with no solution in sight. The world continues to fail civilians caught by conflict and violence."
UNHCR warned that among those who remain forcibly displaced, 7 in 10 refugees have been exiled from their homes for at least five years with little prospect of ever leaving refugee camps with precarious living conditions.
“For too many refugees, displacement starts as a lifeline but lasts a lifetime," said Barham Salih, the UN high commissioner for refugees. "Humanitarian aid saves lives, but it is not the end point and does not enable refugees to become active agents in control of their futures. We need a paradigm shift that creates a new sense of hope and opportunity for people fleeing war and persecution."
Salih called for a reduction by more than half, over the next decade, in the number of refugees who are reliant on humanitarian assistance and are living in temporary shelters.
"The initiative would expand opportunities for voluntary returns, humanitarian visas, and relocation, while transitioning refugees from aid dependency to self-reliance through access to education, healthcare, financial services, and labor markets," said the UNHCR.
The large numbers of people who have been forced from their homes—and in a rising number of cases, forced to return home under duress—"are almost impossible to comprehend," said Egeland. "And as an increasingly nationalistic world becomes increasingly desensitized to what it truly means to be forced to flee home, the gap between decision makers and donors and displaced people continues to widen. This cannot be accepted as the new normal."
“As humanitarians our work is to support displaced people in their hour of greatest need," he added. “But we cannot do this without a world that is willing to stand up for humanity... We must support diplomatic solutions to end crisis, and fund aid to relieve suffering. We must protect civilians and stand up for international humanitarian law. We must all remember our humanity.”
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Aid Groups Warn Excluding Lebanon From Ceasefire 'Risks Prolonging the Crisis'
"Until there is an end to all hostilities, across the entire region, no one will feel truly safe."
Apr 08, 2026
Humanitarian aid organizations warned Wednesday that the Iran ceasefire touted by US President Donald Trump as a monumental step toward peace is at risk of collapsing entirely if it doesn't halt Israel's bombardment of Lebanon, which reached its most intense phase yet in the hours after the two-week truce was announced.
David Miliband, president and CEO of the International Rescue Committee, said the ceasefire announcement late Tuesday was a "welcome step" but warned it was "partial, fragile, and incomplete," pointing to Trump and Israel's claim that Lebanon was not included in the deal's terms. Pakistan, the key mediator of the truce, has said Lebanon was part of the agreed-upon ceasefire, and a halt to Israeli attacks on the country was included in a widely circulated 10-point Iranian plan that Trump characterized as "a workable basis on which to negotiate."
Miliband said Wednesday that leaving "one front of the conflict burning risks prolonging the crisis, not resolving it."
Ahmad Alhendawi, Save the Children's regional director for the Middle East, North Africa, and Eastern Europe, similarly warned that the current ceasefire deal, as implemented, "is not enough."
"We're urgently calling for a definitive ceasefire for the wider region, which includes Lebanon, to protect children from further harm," said Alhendawi. "A whole generation of children bears the brunt of this conflict. A definitive ceasefire for the entire regional conflict, including Lebanon, is the only way to truly protect children’s lives and futures and end the suffering. The violence must end before more children suffer irreparable harm.”
Iranian officials have responded with outrage to Israel's intensified assault on Lebanon, which has killed hundreds of people on Wednesday alone and wounded many more. Abbas Araghchi, Iran's foreign minister, said the Trump administration "must choose—ceasefire or continued war via Israel."
"It cannot have both," he added. "The world sees the massacres in Lebanon. The ball is in the US court, and the world is watching whether it will act on its commitments."
The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday that Iran has informed regional mediators that its participation in planned in-person talks in Pakistan's capital "is conditional on a ceasefire in Lebanon" as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to "continue to strike" the country.
"Sounds like somebody needs to rein in Israel ASAP," Brian Finucane, senior adviser to the US Program at the International Crisis Group, wrote on social media.
"The American people want this war to end and bombing downtown Beirut is not a path to peace."
Trump insisted to a PBS reporter on Wednesday that Lebanon was "not included in the deal," claiming the Israeli assault on the country is "a separate skirmish."
But top Iranian officials, aid organizations, and US lawmakers who support a lasting peace agreement view the conflicts across the region as interconnected.
“Aggression towards Lebanon is aggression towards Iran,” Gen. Seyed Majid Mousavi, aerospace commander of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, said Wednesday.
US Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) urged the Trump administration "must immediately make clear to Israel that the ceasefire agreement is not and cannot be functional without a ceasefire in Lebanon."
"The American people want this war to end," Beyer added, "and bombing downtown Beirut is not a path to peace."
Amitabh Behar, executive director of Oxfam International, said in a statement that "until there is an end to all hostilities, across the entire region, no one will feel truly safe."
"Israel’s ongoing invasion in Lebanon, its destructive occupation of Palestinian territory, ground incursion and airstrikes in Syria, its continued attacks in Gaza, and violent attacks and territorial expansion in the West Bank are still continuing despite the provisional cessation of violence with Iran," said Behar. "This deadly toll across the Middle East is intolerable and must stop."
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Aid Group Warns US-Israeli War on Iran Has Unleashed ‘Triple Emergency’ With Devastating Consequences for Millions
“With global humanitarian needs already at record levels, further escalation of the conflict in the Middle East and wider region will have grave ramifications for crises across the world,” said one advocate.
Mar 20, 2026
The US-Israeli war against Iran has unleashed a "triple emergency" that is draining the global humanitarian aid system of resources and putting millions of the world's most vulnerable people at even greater risk, according to a dire warning issued Friday by the International Rescue Committee.
The war has already resulted in the deaths of thousands and the displacement of millions of people in Iran and Lebanon. But the IRC says that the ripple effects of the war are beginning to spread to conflict zones across the world.
The conflict has caused many nations in the region to partially or fully close their airspace, leaving critical cargo stranded.
Meanwhile, Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz in retaliation for US and Israeli attacks has disrupted the flow of more than 20% of the world’s oil exports, sharply raising transport costs and straining budgets that could go toward lifesaving aid.
“Medical aid is highly dependent on international transport,” said Willem Zuidema, Save the Children’s global supply chain director. “The blockage in the Strait of Hormuz, combined with spiking cost for insurance and fuel, is directly impacting patients in our health facilities, at the worst time possible.”
IRC said $130,000 worth of pharmaceutical aid intended for its humanitarian response to the conflict in Sudan has been left stranded in Dubai due to the strait's closure.
According to Save the Children, this delay has put 90 primary healthcare facilities across Sudan at risk of running low on supplies.
More than 400,000 children, the group estimated, could be affected by the inability to receive antibiotics, antimalarial drugs, pain and fever medications, and other treatments.
The group said it has been forced to deliver the aid using the much more costly method of transporting it across Jeddah, where it will be carried by sea freight to Sudan, which the group said could add as much as $1,000-2,000 per container.
The same is true of humanitarian zones in Afghanistan and Yemen, where treatments for thousands of children must now be delivered by air or by land, dramatically raising the costs.
The closure of the strait has also forced many vessels carrying aid to find alternative routes. IRC said its shipping partners have been forced to reroute their operations to instead travel around Africa's Cape of Good Hope, adding up to a month for ocean freight deliveries to war zones on the continent.
"What we are seeing is the war in Iran unleashing a triple emergency," said David Milliband, the president and CEO of IRC.
"First, a surge in humanitarian need, with Lebanon now the most visible humanitarian scar and one of the fastest-growing displacement crises in the world, with over one million people forced from their homes in weeks," he said.
"Second, a global economic shock, as disruptions to food, fuel, and fertilizer markets, putting up to 30% of fertilizer trade at risk, threatens more than 300 million people already facing acute food insecurity," said Milliband, and "third, a system under strain, with more than 60 conflicts stretching diplomatic attention and funding to a breaking point, pushing crises like Sudan and Gaza further down the list of priorities."
Milliband marveled at the priorities of the powers prosecuting the war. He pointed to a recent estimate from the Pentagon that the first six days of the war alone cost $11.3 billion, noting that "just $4 billion is enough to pay for treatment for every acutely malnourished child in the world."
Zuidema said that the "grave ripple effects" caused by the war are exacerbated by the fact that "governments are cutting vital foreign aid budgets."
He called on all parties to the war to cease hostilities and to adhere to their obligations under international law, including allowing the free flow of humanitarian aid.
“There should be no barriers to lifesaving supplies: Exemptions should be put in place to allow humanitarian supplies, fertilizer, and food to be able to move through the Strait of Hormuz,” Zuidema said. “With global humanitarian needs already at record levels, further escalation of the conflict in the Middle East and wider region will have grave ramifications for crises across the world.”
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IRC Warns of 'Surging Crises and Shrinking Support' as Sudan, Palestine Top 2026 Watchlist
"The New World Disorder is here," said the head of the International Rescue Committee. "The question is whether to respond with vision, an opportunity for reinvention—or with further retreat," said the head of the International Rescue Committee.
Dec 16, 2025
The International Rescue Committee on Tuesday released its annual humanitarian crisis forecast, along with a stark warning that civilians in the countries on its watchlist "are on the front lines of a disintegrating international order and global action is needed to reverse course."
Sudan, Palestine, and South Sudan topped IRC's Emergency Watchlist for 2026, followed by Ethiopia, Haiti, Myanmar, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Mali, Burkina Faso, and Lebanon. Afghanistan, Cameroon, Chad, Colombia, Niger, Nigeria, Somalia, Syria, Ukraine, and Yemen also made the list.
People in some of those countries—including Sudan, Palestine, and Myanmar—are enduring genocidal violence and privation, while nearly all of the other nations on the list are experiencing war or other unrest. Some are also ravaged by climate-driven extreme weather, hunger, and other crises.
"This year’s watchlist identifies a dangerous divergence: surging crises and shrinking support," IRC said on Tuesday. "Home to just 12% of the global population, watchlist countries account for 89% of those in humanitarian need and are projected to host more than half of the world’s extreme poor by 2029."
IRC noted that "117 million people are forcibly displaced" and "nearly 40 million people are facing such severe hunger" in the watchlist countries.
"While crises grow, global humanitarian funding has shrunk by 50%," the group said. "What remains is a humanitarian system underfunded, undercut, and unprepared to meet unprecedented humanitarian crises in 2026."
The world has retreated from humanitarian aid—but violence, hunger and climate threats haven't slowed down. We must not forget about the people for whom crisis is a daily reality. This is our 2026 Emergency Watchlist: www.rescue.org/watchlist2026
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— International Rescue Committee (@rescue.org) December 16, 2025 at 6:28 AM
IRC continued:
This “New World Disorder” is replacing the post-WWII international system once grounded in rules and rights. Defined by intensifying geopolitical rivalries, shifting alliances, and transactional deal-making, this disorder is driving a cascade of crises and eroding global support for the world’s most vulnerable. Global cooperation is unraveling; together with major aid cuts, the [United Nations] Security Council has seen a surge in vetoes, stalling responses to atrocities in Sudan, Syria, and the occupied Palestinian territory. Conflict is increasingly used as a tool for power and profit. In Sudan, warring parties and their backers are profiting from the gold trade, deepening violence and devastating civilians. Meanwhile, impunity is enabled on a dangerous scale. 2025 is on track to be the deadliest year for humanitarians. Attacks on schools have risen nearly 50%, and in Gaza, hospitals, shelters, and essential infrastructure have been bombed or cut off from aid.
“What the IRC is seeing on the ground is not a tragic accident. The world is not simply failing to respond to crisis; actions and words are producing, prolonging, and rewarding it," IRC president and CEO David Miliband said Tuesday in a statement. "The scale of the crisis in Sudan, ranking first on this year’s watchlist for the third year in a row and now the largest humanitarian crisis ever recorded, is a signature of this disorder."
Fighting between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces—a paramilitary militia born from the Janjaweed co-perpetrators of the first Darfur genocide—continues, with all warring parties, especially the RSF, committing war crimes and crimes against humanity, according to human rights groups. The conflict in Sudan has fueled one of the world’s most acute humanitarian catastrophes, with more than 12 million people displaced and famine confirmed in Darfur's largest refuge camp last year. More than 20 million people are facing acute hunger.
In order to respond more efficiently to global humanitarian crises, IRC recommends:
- Reinvigorating diplomacy, including by empowering the UN to collectively address global challenges by supporting the suspension of Security Council veto power in cases of mass atrocities;
- Protecting civilians and fighting impunity, including by withholding arms sales when violations occur or are at risk of occurring and supporting UN accountability mechanisms; and
- Improving the allocation and delivery of aid, including by reorganizing allocation, prioritizing most vulnerable populations when planning climate adaptation finance, and expanding donor bases.
“This year’s watchlist is a testament to misery but also a warning: Without urgent action from those with power to make a difference, 2026 risks becoming the most dangerous year yet," Miliband said.
That urgent action won't be coming from the United States, where the Trump administration has dramatically slashed international humanitarian assistance despite warnings that such cuts would cause millions of deaths. One of many examples stands out for sheer crassness: As South Sudanese babies and others died of cholera following the closure of local health clinics, US officials celebrated successfully slashing aid budgets and services with congratulations and cake, according to a report published Monday by ProPublica.
"Civilians in watchlist countries are paying the price today. The IRC stands with them to deliver practical solutions that save lives and restore hope," said Miliband. "But the New World Disorder is here, and winds are picking up everywhere. Disorder begets disorder. The question is whether to respond with vision, an opportunity for reinvention—or with further retreat.”
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Israeli Assault Has Left 50,000+ Gaza Kids Orphaned or Separated From Parents: Report
"In Gaza, children are the most vulnerable group, and their basic needs, especially their sense of safety, have become non-existent," said one relief worker.
Oct 09, 2024
The International Rescue Committee said Wednesday that the number of children who have been orphaned or separated from their parents is likely three times higher than the amount estimated by the United Nations earlier this year, with thousands of children caught up in the chaos of escalating Israeli attacks and evacuation orders in recent months.
Official estimates of orphaned or unaccompanied children range from about 17,000-19,000, but the IRC said that "based on previous experience of other crises," the number is likely as high as 51,000.
The IRC said that the Israel Defense Forces' (IDF) continued assault on Gaza, where it has repeatedly attacked civilian infrastructure and so-called "humanitarian zones"—in many cases with U.S. weapons—risks creating a "forgotten generation."
The group's report came out as IDF attacks on northern Gaza entered their fifth day, forcing thousands of people to flee to the supposed safe zone of Al-Mawasi, which has been targeted repeatedly by Israel in recent months. Dozens of people have been killed in the IDF's recent escalation in the north.
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) also reported that at least seven schools being used as shelters for displaced people had been evacuated due to Israeli attacks.
Along with evacuations, the arrests of hundreds of Palestinians in Gaza have exacerbated the rise in the number of unaccompanied children, said the IRC.
The group said its humanitarian workers have encountered children living alone in hospitals and that unaccompanied and orphaned children are at high risk for exploitation, child labor, and starvation, especially as Gaza's entire population of 2.3 million people faces acute food insecurity.
"In Gaza, children are the most vulnerable group, and their basic needs, especially their sense of safety, have become non-existent," said Faten Abu Mousa, child protection manager for the IRC in Gaza.
"Children in Gaza cannot wait any longer, prolonged restrictions on humanitarian aid and continued fighting means that a generation of children will now experience life-long health and developmental issues."
The group said it has partially focused its work on providing mental health and other support services to children, especially those who have lost or been separated from their parents or caregivers.
Even before Israel's latest escalation in Gaza, which passed the one-year mark on Monday, at least half a million children in the enclave were in need of mental health and psycho-social support, said the IRC.
"Now, the burden of witnessing profoundly distressing events, multiple displacements, and lack of safety means that every child, parent, and caregiver in Gaza is experiencing trauma, which could require long-term mental health and psycho-social support," said the organization.
The IRC warned that its aid teams have seen "increased rates of severe and acute malnutrition in children under five" across Gaza with humanitarian operations in northern Gaza "severely restricted" due to the current wave of attacks.
"Even if a child survives acute malnutrition, they will often face long-term health impacts, and require lifelong support," said the group, warning of the risk of stunting—when a child's growth and cognitive development are behind for their age—and wasting, when a child's weight is too low for their height due to rapid weight loss from lack of nutrition.
"In these cases, the child's risk of death is more than 11 times higher than that of a healthy child especially because their weakened bodies are not able to fight off common diseases," said the IRC.
Children across the enclave have also missed an entire of year of schooling, and the trauma and destruction of Israel's bombardment is likely to set back children's education for up to five years in Gaza, where education and high literacy rates have long been a source of pride.
"Children are bearing the brunt of this war, and it's clear that without an immediate and lasting cease-fire in sight, the long-term impacts will only become greater," said Bart Witteveen, IRC country director for the occupied Palestinian territory. "The international community must act immediately to safeguard children, not just in the immediate term, but also taking into account their long-term health needs, whether related to mental health, healthcare, or education. Children in Gaza cannot wait any longer, prolonged restrictions on humanitarian aid and continued fighting means that a generation of children will now experience life-long health and developmental issues."
Humanitarian groups have called for a lasting cease-fire in Gaza for a year, but the conflict has spread to other parts of the Middle East in recent weeks, with Israel invading Lebanon last month and killing more than 2,100 people there in recent attacks, Iran retaliating against Israel last week, and some U.S. lawmakers pushing for an attack on Iran.
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UNRWA Says There Is 'Nowhere to Go' as Israel Orders Evacuation of Gaza Safe Zones
"People remain trapped in an endless nightmare of death and destruction on a staggering scale," the U.N. agency wrote on social media.
Aug 16, 2024
Following a series of evacuation orders this week, Israeli forces issued another on Friday for areas in central and southern Gaza, including "safe zones," leaving Palestinian families gripped with fear and with "nowhere to go," according to the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East.
Israel's Arabic spokesperson announced on social media that people in six neighborhood blocks in various towns, several of which were part of a proclaimed humanitarian zone, must "immediately move," leading to a scramble of evacuations in those areas.
"Once again, fear spreads as families have nowhere to go," UNRWA wrote on social media. "People remain trapped in an endless nightmare of death and destruction on a staggering scale."
#Gaza: New evacuation orders have been issued by Israeli authorities, even inside the so-called “humanitarian zone”.
Once again, fear spreads as families have nowhere to go. People remain trapped in an endless nightmare of death and destruction on a staggering scale. pic.twitter.com/Myi6z6Ix87
— UNRWA (@UNRWA) August 16, 2024
Friday's evacuation orders were for areas in eastern Deir el-Balah, al-Qarara, al-Mawasi, al-Jalaa, Hamad City, and Nasser, Al Jazeera reported.
An Israeli military strike on al-Mawasi, previously a humanitarian zone though long the target of Israeli strikes, killed four Palestinians including three children, the news outlet reported on Friday.
The Israeli army said Hamas had used the areas to fire mortar and rocket attacks, and explained that it had issued warning flyers and text message alerts to reduce the impact on the Palestinian civilian population, according to Reuters.
Bombings and evacuations have continued this week—at least 80 Palestinians were killed in a strike on a school-turned-shelter on Sunday—even as peace talks proceeded in Doha, Qatar. A two-day session of talks finished Friday, with the United States, Egypt, and Qatar saying progress was made and they hoped to seal a deal between Israel and Hamas next week. Hamas didn't directly participate in this week's talks because the militant Palestinian group said Israel had added new demands to a proposal it had already agreed to in principle.
The death toll of Palestinians during the 10-month war, based on figures from Gaza's health ministry, reached 40,000 this week—what the U.N. called a "dark milestone."
"Most of the dead are women and children," U.N. rights chief Volker Türk said in a statement. "This unimaginable situation is overwhelmingly due to recurring failures by the Israeli Defense Forces to comply with the rules of war."
"On average, about 130 people have been killed every day in Gaza over the past 10 months," he added, saying the "scale of the Israeli military's destruction of homes, hospitals, schools, and places of worship [is] deeply shocking."
Türk said that both Israel and armed Palestinian groups including Hamas had committed serious violations of international humanitarian law. The armed Palestinian groups killed more than 1,100 Israelis in a shocking and horrifying massacre in southern Israel on October 7 in which they also took some 250 hostages.
Israel's sustained assault on Gaza over the last 10 months has not only killed a disproportionate number of children but also displaced most of those who've survived—and separated many from their families.
A report released Friday by the International Rescue Committee (IRC) documents the scale of the separation crisis and its psychological toll on unaccompanied children. UNICEF estimates that roughly 17,000 Gazan children are unaccompanied, but the IRC warns that the real figure may be much higher.
Unaccompanied youth are at risk of labor exploitation, starvation, and mental health problems that can plague them for the rest of their lives. Gazan children, shocked by the war, are "clinging to others during loud sounds, wetting the bed, having nightmares, and are wanting to sleep under the bed to feel secure," the report says.
The Associated Press reported Tuesday that Israeli strikes were leaving "children without parents and parents without children," and has previously reported that the war has wiped out entire Palestinian extended families.
Israeli violence against Palestinians has not been restricted to Gaza. Israeli settlers attacked the West Bank town of Jit on Thursday night, setting fire to cars and houses, killing one Palestinian man and seriously injuring another. Jack Lew, the U.S. ambassador to Israel, said he was "appalled" by the attack and the perpetrators should be held accountable, but Israeli human rights group B'Tselem responded on social media by saying that the Israeli state and its leadership should be held accountable.
The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs on Wednesday reported that it had recorded about 1,250 settler attacks on Palestinians since October 7. The settlements are illegal under international law, according to the International Court of Justice.
The push for a peace deal is aimed not just at ending the carnage in Gaza and defusing West Bank tensions but also preventing a wider war in the Middle East. Israel is bracing for retaliation from Iran and Hezbollah after it conducted assassinations of Hamas and Hezbollah leaders in Tehran and Beirut in late July.
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'Beyond Comprehension': Medical Team Reports Starvation, Infections at Gaza Hospital
"We're doing everything we can, navigating through critical shortages and working with very limited resources, to save lives amidst this dire situation."
Mar 25, 2024
Members of an emergency medical team that has treated patients at a hospital in southern Gaza in recent weeks said Monday that the horrors they've witnessed there are "unimaginable," from worsening malnutrition to deadly infections stemming from lack of healthcare equipment.
The team formed by Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP), the International Rescue Committee (IRC), and the Palestine Children's Relief Fund (PCRF) has been working at the European Hospital near Khan Younis, a city decimated by Israeli bombing. At least two hospitals in the city are currently under siege by Israeli forces, which have killed more than 32,000 Gazans and injured tens of thousands more in less than six months.
"The situation we're facing is beyond comprehension," said Arvind Das, IRC's Gaza team lead. "Continuous Israeli military operations near hospitals are making an already tense situation even worse for those seeking shelter or medical help, pushing the healthcare system to the brink of collapse."
"Despite the relentless efforts of our medical teams, the infrastructure necessary to deliver optimal medical care has been severely compromised by bombing, stringent restrictions on the entry of aid including medical supplies, and the overwhelming surge in needs," Das added. "We're doing everything we can, navigating through critical shortages and working with very limited resources, to save lives amidst this dire situation."
Not a single hospital in the Gaza Strip is fully functional after months of Israeli attacks, and the dozen that are partially operating are well beyond capacity, with patients and displaced people filling the hallways and outskirts of the facilities. The United Nations' special rapporteur on the right to health has accused Israel's military of waging an "unrelenting war" on Gaza's medical system.
Dr. Konstantina Ilia Karydi, an anesthetist with the emergency medical team, said Monday that the European Hospital "had an original capacity of just 200 beds, and at the moment it has expanded to 1,000 beds."
"There are around 22,000 people that have been displaced from other parts of Gaza sheltering in the corridors and in tents inside the hospital, because people feel that it's safer to be here than anywhere else," said Karydi.
"We worked around the challenges we faced and managed in a different way, but the staff here are overwhelmed."
MAP said in a statement that the medical team's surgeons "completed successful complex vascular and orthopedic surgeries on patients" at the hospital, but some "later died due to infections in the hospitals and the inability to provide post-operative care."
"This is due to the intense security situation that forced healthcare workers to evacuate hospitals and hindered their access," said MAP. "Moreover, significant damage to hospital infrastructure and facilities, coupled with a complete shortage of equipment and medicine—largely due to Israel's restrictions on medical aid entry into Gaza—severely impacted the ability to provide necessary care."
Dr. Husam Basheer, an orthopedic surgeon with the emergency medical team, stressed that healthcare workers in the territory are "managing with the bare minimum of resources," lacking even basic supplies such as gauze.
"We worked around the challenges we faced and managed in a different way," said Basheer, "but the staff here are overwhelmed."
The medical team's report added to the abundance of harrowing accounts from healthcare personnel on the devastating conditions inside Gaza's hospitals, many of which have been shelled and raided—in some cases repeatedly—by Israeli forces.
Al Jazeera reported Monday that the Israeli military has "surrounded the al-Amal and Nasser hospitals in southern Gaza, while pressing on with their siege of Gaza City's al-Shifa Hospital, the largest medical complex in the strip."
"Military vehicles, tanks, and attack drones are encircling these two facilities," Al Jazeera's Hani Mahmoud reported. "They're also blocking the entrance with piles of sand, preventing medical staff, patients, and injured people inside from leaving safely and constantly failing to provide a safe corridor for people and evacuees trapped inside the hospital."
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the World Health Organization, responded with alarm Monday to reports that Israeli forces killed a Palestinian Red Crescent Society volunteer and a displaced person sheltering at al-Amal Hospital in Khan Younis.
"Another reported attack on al-Amal hospital in Gaza, another situation where patients and health workers are in great jeopardy," Tedros wrote on social media. "We appeal for their immediate protection, and repeat our call for a cease-fire."
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As Starvation Death Toll Grows in Gaza, Israel Blocks Aid Over Scissors in Child Medical Kits
The decision demonstrates "why there can be no end to the genocide of Palestinians without an end of Israel's control over Gaza," said one human rights lawyer.
Mar 12, 2024
With the level of humanitarian aid reaching Gaza residents perilously low and creating what one group last week called "famine-like conditions" throughout the enclave, the United Nations' top official overseeing relief for Palestinians on Tuesday condemned Israel's latest reason for blocking a shipment: It included medical scissors for caring for children.
Israel flagged the scissors as a so-called "dual-use" item, suggesting the government feared medical workers in Gaza—where more than 600 attacks on hospitals have pushed the healthcare system toward collapse—would use the scissors as weapons instead of to care for people who have been injured in relentless bombings.
"Medical scissors are now added to a long list of banned items the Israeli authorities classify as 'for dual use,'" said Philippe Lazzarini, commissioner-general of the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). "The list includes basic and lifesaving items: from anesthetics, solar lights, oxygen cylinders, and ventilators, to water cleaning tablets, cancer medicines, and maternity kits."
The truck carrying the medical kits and other items was turned back a day after 12 Israeli human rights groups condemned the right-wing government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for openly violating an order from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) by continuing to obstruct humanitarian aid.
The ICJ issued an interim ruling in January saying that Israel was "plausibly" committing a genocide in Gaza and ordering the government to ensure the delivery of aid.
Mai El-Sadany, executive director of the Tahrir Institute for Middle East Policy in Washington, D.C., said Israel's latest move to block relief from reaching starving Gaza residents should eliminate any doubt that the government is flouting the ICJ's order.
The death toll from starvation in Gaza has now reached at least 25 people, mostly children. In what the International Rescue Committee called a "conservative" estimate late last month, at least 1 in 4 households—more than half a million people—are now facing "catastrophic or famine conditions."
Juliette Touma, director of communications for UNRWA, told Al Jazeera Monday that a minimum of 500 aid trucks daily—the number that entered Gaza each day before the war—are needed to meet the needs of the civilian population. An average of 90 trucks entered the enclave per day in February, with the number as low as seven or nine on some days.
The World Health Organization said Monday that it had reached Al-Ahil Arab Hospital and Al-Sahaba Hospital in northern Gaza with trauma supplies to serve 150 patients over the weekend.
Medical teams there, however, still lack basic necessities to care for people, including "food, fuel, specialized staff, anesthetic drugs, antibiotics, and internal fixation devices," WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.
George Washington University professor William Lafi Youmans condemned the blocking of the aid truck carrying medical kits as "deplorable" and "nonsensical."
Human rights lawyer Zaha Hassan of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace said Israel's decision underscores the need for an immediate, permanent cease-fire in Gaza and an end to Israel's occupation of Palestinian territory including Gaza and the West Bank.
"Returning an entire truckload of humanitarian assistance because children's scissors were part of a medical kit," said Hassan, "is why there can be no end to the genocide of Palestinians without an end of Israel's control over Gaza."
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Pediatrician Details 'Cataclysmic' Reality for Gaza Kids Under Israel Assault
"I remember I was counseling new mothers on breastfeeding, and I looked out of the ward, and there were plumes of smoke rising in the air and bombs narrowing in on the hospital, and it felt very surreal," said Dr. Seema Jilani.
Jan 31, 2024
In what one historian called "an understated plea for the world to not look away," a pediatrician who has provided care across the globe and in numerous war zones described in an interview with The New Yorker on Tuesday how over two weeks working in a hospital in Gaza recently, she saw firsthand how Israel's U.S.-backed assault on the blockaded enclave has created conditions unlike anything she has witnessed elsewhere.
Dr. Seema Jilani, a senior technical adviser at the International Rescue Committee, told journalist Isaac Chotiner about the life-and-death decisions doctors in Gaza are being forced to make on a daily basis, even as they try to keep their own families safe from Israel's relentless air and ground attacks.
Jilani arrived in central Gaza for a two-week assignment around Christmas Day and immediately began working alongside Palestinian doctors at Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir al Balah, where she worked to save as many lives as she could as the facility faced a dwindling supply of medical equipment and medications including morphine—forcing them to rely on over-the-counter drugs like Motrin to provide pain relief to people with serious injuries and burns.
"Within the two weeks that I was there, I saw it go from a semi-functional hospital to a barely or nonfunctional hospital as a result of increasing violence in surrounding areas," Jilani told The New Yorker.
The U.S.-born pediatrician, who has treated civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan previously, described a one-year-old boy who was among the first patients she treated at Al-Aqsa:
His right arm and right leg had been blown off by a bomb, and flesh was still hanging off the foot. He had a bloodstained diaper, which remained, but there was no leg below. I treated the baby while he lay on the ground. There were no stretchers available because all the beds had already been taken, considering that many people were also trying to use the hospital as a shelter or safe space for their families. Next to him there was a man who was on his last breaths. He had been actively dying for the last twenty-four hours, and flies were already on him. All the while, a woman was brought in and was declared dead on arrival. This one-year-old had blood pouring into his chest cavity. He needed a chest tube so he wouldn't asphyxiate on his own blood. But there were neither chest tubes nor blood-pressure cuffs that were available in pediatric sizes. No morphine had been given in the chaos, and it wasn't even available. This patient in America would've immediately gone to the O.R., but instead the orthopedic surgeon bandaged the stumps up and said he couldn’t take him to the operating theater right now because there were more pressing emergencies. And I tried to imagine what was more pressing than a one-year-old with no hand and no legs who was choking on his own blood. So that, to me, was symbolic of the impossible choices inflicted on the doctors of Gaza, and how truly cataclysmic that situation is.
Doctors and nurses in Gaza are trying to provide care in a state of "chaos," Jilani told the magazine, with patients arriving at the few remaining functional hospitals "on makeshift stretchers, if you're lucky, or by an ambulance that was overflowing with people, [or] via donkeys."
Jilani's organization also posted a video of her speaking about her time in Gaza, where she saw one physician pitching in at the hospital after he had visited a friend who was there.
"That's the level of devastation but the level of commitment that the Palestinian healthcare forces is having right now," said Jilani.
Since Israel began its bombardment in October, Jilani and other humanitarian volunteers have gone to Gaza to help "fill in some gaps" left by doctors who have been displaced and forced to leave their homes to protect their families. As Jilani's assignment drew to a close, the situation at Al-Aqsa grew more perilous.
"Each day became more and more tense, with more and more people piling into surrounding areas looking for safe shelter," Jilani told The New Yorker. "I remember I was counseling new mothers on breastfeeding, and I looked out of the ward, and there were plumes of smoke rising in the air and bombs narrowing in on the hospital, and it felt very surreal. One day, a bullet went through the ICU. The next day, the road to the hospital had been deemed unsafe for us to use. And then the Israeli military dropped leaflets, designating areas surrounding the hospital as a red zone. Given the history of recent attacks on medical staff and facilities in Gaza, our team was unable to return, and people began evacuating the area in panic."
Soon after Jilani left Gaza, Al Jazeera reported that hundreds of patients and medical staffers were missing from Al-Aqsa after being "forced to leave" due to Israeli strikes in the area.
Jilani told The New Yorker that prior to the mass evacuation from the hospital, "there was a period of time when I believe they ran out of fuel."
"I don't know if that has been refreshed or not, but all I know is I can't stop thinking of whether my patients got out, my babies in the neonatal I.C.U. incubators," said Jilani. "Who would take care of them? The kids with facial burns: How are they going to be able to see enough, and be well enough to leave? So I don't know, and I wish I did have more information on that."
The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) reported Wednesday that as Israeli forces have killed at least 26,900 Palestinians since October 7, 19,000 children in Gaza have been left orphaned. In addition to facing the threat of relentless bombings and ground attacks, the enclave's population is also "starving to death," the World Health Organization's emergencies director said Wednesday, with all 2.2 million residents "at imminent risk of famine" due to Israel's blocking of humanitarian aid.
While traveling to Al-Aqsa from Rafah, on the border of Egypt and Gaza, Jilani told The New Yorker that she witnessed "a sea of human tragedy," with huge crowds of displaced people "walking barefoot" or crammed into donkey carts or vehicles, with "looks of total resignation and abject despair."
"I'm a pediatrician, so I didn't expect to be of great use in a war zone," Jilani said. "I'm disheartened and really disturbed to say that I had many, many pediatric patients who were war-wounded, burned orphans, traumatic amputations, and that is something different than what I witnessed in Iraq, or elsewhere."
Dónal Hassett, a historian at University College Cork in Ireland, called Jilani's account "harrowing."
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Infectious Diseases Surging in Gaza Amid Israeli Siege, Healthcare System Collapse
"The humanitarian suffering in Gaza has already reached catastrophic levels, and it's set to get worse unless something changes immediately," said one human rights official.
Nov 09, 2023
The infectious disease outbreaks that doctors on the ground, public health officials, and humanitarian groups have been warning about for weeks in Gaza appear to be in full force, the World Health Organization said Thursday as it reiterated its call for a cease-fire to save lives.
The global public health organization said authorities have reported a surge in cases of diarrhea, with more than half of those affected children under the age of 5, as Israel's decision to cut off fuel access in the blockaded enclave has shut down water desalination plants and disrupted waste collection. The circumstances have created "an environment conducive to the rapid and widespread proliferation of insects, rodents that can carry and transit diseases."
By Thursday, said the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, all of Gaza's 120 municipal water wells were expected to be depleted.
Health officials in the blockaded enclave, where nearly 11,000 civilians have now been killed, are also reporting nearly 9,000 cases of scabies and lice; 12,600 cases of skin rashes; more than 1,000 reports of chickenpox; and nearly 55,000 cases of upper respiratory infections as roughly 1.5 million displaced people crowd into hospitals, churches, schools, and shelters in search of safety from Israel's relentless bombardment.
The International Rescue Committee (IRC) warned that those disease outbreaks could soon give way to the spread of more deadly illnesses like cholera and typhoid due to 95% of residents' forced reliance on unsanitary water in the past month.
"The humanitarian suffering in Gaza has already reached catastrophic levels, and it's set to get worse unless something changes immediately," said Bob Kitchen, vice president of emergencies for IRC. "While the overwhelming driver of mortality remains the ongoing violence and destruction, a humanitarian ceasefire now would also serve to help aid agencies get ahead of a looming public health crisis within an already vast humanitarian crisis... The conditions are ripe for the spread of communicable and waterborne diseases—diseases that adversely affect children and lead to preventable deaths."
Al Jazeera reported earlier this month that experts have surmised Israel is intentionally leaving Palestinians in Gaza with a lack of safe drinking water, using "water access as a weapon of war" and intensifying the humanitarian catastrophe.
In overcrowded shelters run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, WHO said, an average of 160 people are sharing one toilet and there is only one shower for every 700 people, compounding the unsanitary conditions and raising the risk of disease outbreaks.
With aid convoys largely blocked at the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt, cleaning supplies as well as medicines have no way of getting to hospitals and shelters, and water supplies that humanitarian groups have managed to get through the crossing are only 4% of what is needed.
Medical workers also don't have sufficient personal protective equipment, making it more likely that they will acquire and transmit infections to the patients they are desperately trying to care for.
The impending colder weather is raising alarm over the potential for worsening malnutrition and food shortages, particularly for more than 50,000 pregnant people and about 337,000 children under the age of 5 in Gaza.
Kitchen said groups including the IRC are working to scale up their infection control programs as quickly as they can but warned that their efforts will remain severely obstructed as long as powerful countries including the United States refuse to support calls for a cease-fire.
"Without a meaningful humanitarian cease-fire to allow the free flow of aid, the suffering of innocent Palestinian civilians will continue," said Kitchen. "Immediate and sustained diplomatic intervention is urgently needed to enable a humanitarian cease-fire, which would pave the way for addressing these pressing humanitarian and protection needs and halt the health catastrophe that will lead to more deaths, particularly among children."
WHO also reiterated its demand for "the unconditional release of all hostages [by Hamas] and a humanitarian cease-fire to prevent further death and suffering."
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