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It Took 24 Hours to Speak the Names of 12,000 Children Israel Killed in Gaza—A Fraction of the Total
The vigil at Harvard University took place as UNICEF said that at least 50,000 Palestinian children have been killed or wounded in Gaza during 600 days of Israeli bombs, bullets, and blockades.
May 28, 2025
Community members concluded a 24-hour vigil at Harvard University on Wednesday during which the names of almost 12,000 children slain in Gaza by Israeli forces were read aloud, signifying only a partial list of child casualties documented by the United Nations Children's Fund, which found that at least 50,000 Palestinian children have been killed or wounded in the embattled enclave during 600 days of U.S.-backed genocidal slaughter.
They All Have Names—a coalition of parents, educators, students, healthcare workers, faith leaders, and other community members—gathered at Harvard Square in Cambridge, Massachusetts to hold the vigil ahead of Harvard University's commencement ceremonies on Thursday.
"These children—lives that should never be reduced to numbers—are now part of a long, harrowing list of unimaginable horrors."
According to the Harvard branch of Students for Justice in Palestine, it took nearly an hour-and-a-half just to read the names of infants killed by Israeli forces since October 7, 2023. Victims' names were read in ascending order of their ages.
"At least 17,400 children have been killed in Gaza since October 7," said Dr. Lara Jirmanus a family physician and clinical instructor at Harvard Medical School. "They include at least 825 babies who could not celebrate their first birthday; 895 one-year olds; 3,266 preschoolers; 4,032 between the ages of 6 and 10; 3,646 middle schoolers; and 2,949 teenagers."
Faculty, staff, and community members have held vigil at Harvard Square in support of Gaza, reading the names of Palestinian children killed by 'Israel' since October 2023. pic.twitter.com/96BZWdtjEM
— Kuffiya (@Kuffiyateam) May 28, 2025
"We gather today to remember them, their hopes, and dreams," Jirmanus added. "And to remember that we have the power to stop this unspeakable catastrophe, by demanding our elected officials stop sending arms for genocide."
The vigil occurred against a backdrop of continued genocide denial and aspersions of casualty data provided by the Gaza Health Ministry—figures that Israeli military officials have repeatedly found to be accurate, and that peer-reviewed research published in The Lancet, one of the world's preeminent medical journals, has determined to likely be a vast undercount.
Jirmanus told Common Dreams that the names of around 12,000 children killed in Gaza between October 2023 and October 2024 were recited during the vigil at a rate of about 500 names per hour.
As the vigil took place, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF)—which has called Gaza "the world's most dangerous place to be a child"—announced its latest estimate that 50,000 Palestinian children have been killed or injured in Gaza since Israel began attacking and besieging the strip in retaliation for the Hamas-led attack of October 7, 2023.
All told, the Gaza Health Ministry says that at least 191,285 Palestinians have been killed or wounded by Israeli forces, including upward of 14,000 people who are missing and believed to be dead and buried beneath rubble of hundreds of thousands of bombed buildings.
Among those maimed by Israel's onslaught are thousands of children who have had one or more limbs amputated, often without anesthesia due to the Israeli blockade. Many surviving Palestinian children have also lost one or both parents. Some have lost their entire families. A new acronym has even been coined to describe some of these orphans: WCNSF, or "wounded child, no surviving family."
"In a 72-hour period this weekend, images from two horrific attacks provide yet more evidence of the unconscionable cost of this ruthless war on children in the Gaza Strip," UNICEF Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa Edouard Beigbeder said in a statement.
"On Friday, we saw videos of the bodies of burnt, dismembered children from the al-Najjar family being pulled from the rubble of their home in Khan Younis," Beigbeder noted. "Of 10 siblings under 12 years old, only one reportedly survived, with critical injuries."
"Early Monday, we saw images of a small child trapped in a burning school in Gaza City. That attack, in the early hours of the morning, reportedly killed at least 31 people, including 18 children," he continued.
"These children—lives that should never be reduced to numbers—are now part of a long, harrowing list of unimaginable horrors: the grave violations against children, the blockade of aid, the starvation, the constant forced displacement, and the destruction of hospitals, water systems, schools, and homes," Beigbeder added. "In essence, the destruction of life itself in the Gaza Strip."
Last year, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres for the first time added Israel to his so-called "List of Shame" of countries that kill and injure children during wars and other armed conflicts.
The Harvard vigil took place as Israeli occupation forces pressed ahead with
Operation Gideon's Chariots, a campaign of conquest, indefinite occupation, and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from Gaza to make way for new Israeli settlements.
They All Have Names noted:
Conditions in Gaza are more catastrophic than ever, as Israel has blocked humanitarian aid for nearly three months, only recently allowing a few trucks of aid, which the U.N. warned was "nowhere near enough." Using starvation as a weapon of war is a war crime. Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Doctors without Borders, and an independent U.N. commission have all concluded that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.
As officials in Gaza report hundreds of deaths—mostly of children and elders—from malnutrition and lack of medical care, even Israeli officials are speaking out against what former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert recently called a "war of extermination."
Extermination and forced starvation are among the alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity for which current Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is wanted by the International Criminal Court in The Hague. The other Hague-based global tribunal, the International Court of Justice, is currently weighing a genocide case against Israel brought by South Africa and backed by dozens of countries, either individually or as members of regional blocs.
The 24-hour vigil also took place as U.S. President Donald Trump and his Republican administration—which continues to offer billions of dollars in arms as well as diplomatic support for Israel even as it acknowledges the mass starvation Gaza—wage a rhetorical and financial war against Harvard.
While the administration claims its moves to strip Harvard of federal funding and contracts and block international students from attending the nation's oldest university are responses to its failure to adequately address alleged antisemitism on campus, many critics argue Trump is targeting the Ivy League school over its defiance of the president's "war on woke" and to bend other powerful institutions to his will.
"While we are relieved that Harvard has not conceded to all of the Trump administration's demands, we continue to be alarmed by the university's repressive measures which have been aimed at silencing dissent and protest against genocide, and eliminating teaching and research about Palestine," vigil co-organizer Sandra Susan Smith, who is a professor of criminal justice at Harvard Kennedy School, said Tuesday.
"We call on Harvard to defend free speech, academic freedom, and to adopt an ethical investment policy to ensure that it is not funding human rights abuses with its $50 billion endowment," she added.
Vigil participants and UNICEF both called for an immediate cease-fire in Gaza.
"The children of Gaza need protection. They need food, water, and medicine. They need a cease-fire," said Beigbeder. "But more than anything, they need immediate, collective action to stop this once and for all."
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'A Failure of Humanity': Acute Food Insecurity, Child Malnutrition Climb for Sixth Straight Year
"In a world of plenty, there is no excuse for children to go hungry or die of malnutrition. Hunger gnaws at the stomach of a child. It gnaws, too, at their dignity, their sense of safety, and their future," said the head of UNICEF.
May 16, 2025
Both child malnutrition and acute food insecurity rose for the sixth consecutive year in 2024, when more than 295 million people across 53 countries and territories endured severe hunger, according to a global report released Friday.
"This Global Report on Food Crises is another unflinching indictment of a world dangerously off course," United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres wrote in the foreword of the annual publication, produced by the European Union-funded Food Security Information Network in partnership with U.N. agencies and other entities.
"From Gaza and Sudan, to Yemen, and Mali, catastrophic hunger driven by conflict and other factors is hitting record highs, pushing households to the edge of starvation," he warned. "Displacement has also surged, as violence and disasters rip families from their homes and condemn people of all ages to malnutrition and even death. Meanwhile climate extremes are growing in intensity—wreaking havoc on global food security, crippling harvests, and breaking supply chains."
"Hunger in the 21st century is indefensible."
Guterres argued that "this is more than a failure of systems—it is a failure of humanity. Hunger in the 21st century is indefensible...
Governments, businesses, and decision-makers must heed the clear warnings issued in this report."
In addition to the places Guterres spotlighted, countries that have the largest numbers or shares of people contending with high levels of acute food insecurity include Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Haiti, Myanmar, Namibia, Nigeria, Pakistan, South Sudan, Sudan, Syrian Arab Republic, and Zambia.
Last July, after over a year of civil war in Sudan, an Integrated Food Security Phase Classification panel declared a famine there, the first declaration since 2020. The IPC's Famine Review Committee has also warned of imminent famine in Gaza, the Palestinian territory that continues to endure a U.S.-backed Israeli military assault and humanitarian aid blockade, for which Israel faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice.
The number of people enduring high levels of acute food insecurity rose by 13.7 million from 2023 to 2024. During that time, the number of people facing the worst level on the IPC scale—"catastrophe," or Phase 5—doubled to almost 2 million, "driven by conflict," the report states. "Over 95% of them were in Palestine (Gaza Strip) and the Sudan. South Sudan, Haiti, and Mali also had populations in this phase."
Over 35.1 million people in three dozen countries and territories experienced the next highest level, "emergency" or Phase 4, followed by around 190 million across 40 places who faced "crisis" or Phase 3. Another 344.7 million people in 39 nations were in Phase 2, or "stressed."
Some areas don't have IPC analyses. The publication notes that "in these cases, 68.2 million people faced high levels of acute food insecurity" based on other reporting. While "conflict/insecurity" was the biggest driver of acute hunger last year, economic shocks and weather extremes also played major roles—and the report underscores "the interlinkages between drivers."
"For instance, conflict can exacerbate climate vulnerability by fueling environmental degradation and taking resources away from adaptation efforts," the report details. "Weather extremes can trigger or worsen conflict as groups compete over the changing availability and distribution of natural resources."
"Extreme weather events can cause economic shocks by damaging productive capital and infrastructure, disrupting economic activity, lowering productivity in agriculture, and diverting resources towards reconstruction," the report continues. "Economic shocks leading to unemployment and increasing levels of poverty can lead to social unrest, violence, conflict, and political instability."
This is the first Global Report on Food Crises to feature "nutrition crises" and "nutrition concerns." For the 53 countries and territories with data, 26 fell into the crisis category, and nearly all of them were in the IPC phase in which "at least 15% of children aged 6-59 months suffered from acute malnutrition."
"Around 37.7 million children suffered from acute malnutrition in the 26 countries/territories. Over 10 million of them had severe acute malnutrition. About 10.9 million pregnant and breastfeeding women in 21 of the countries were acutely malnourished," the report states. Sudan, Gaza, Mali, and Yemen "had the four most severe nutrition crises."
Catherine Russell, executive director of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), said in a Friday statement that "in a world of plenty, there is no excuse for children to go hungry or die of malnutrition. Hunger gnaws at the stomach of a child. It gnaws, too, at their dignity, their sense of safety, and their future."
"How can we continue to stand by when there is more than enough food to feed every hungry child in the world?" she asked. "How can we ignore what is happening in front of our eyes? Millions of children's lives hang in the balance as funding is slashed to critical nutrition services."
World Food Program Executive Director Cindy McCain also emphasized financial concerns, saying that "like every other humanitarian organization, WFP is facing deep budget shortfalls which have forced drastic cuts to our food assistance programs. Millions of hungry people have lost, or will soon lose, the critical lifeline we provide. We have tried and tested solutions to hunger and food insecurity. But we need the support of our donors and partners to implement them."
The Global Report on Food Crises reveals a staggering reality: 295 million people in 53 countries/territories faced high levels of acute food insecurity in 2024. At @fao.org we know that #AgricultureCan be the solution, but we need the right support. ➡️ bit.ly/4khEGCx #FightFoodCrises #GRFC2025
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— Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (@fao.org) May 16, 2025 at 6:11 AM
The report also has a section on displacement, which notes that "nearly all countries with food crises have large displaced populations, but data on their acute food insecurity status are only available in about a quarter of these countries, despite clear evidence regarding the specific challenges displaced people have in accessing food."
Last year, forced displacement in countries and territories with food crises continued rising, to 95.8 million people in 52 places, consisting of 71.8 million internally displaced persons and 24 million refugees.
Raouf Mazou from the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees said Friday that "as food insecurity worsens and humanitarian crises become more prolonged, we need to shift from emergency aid to sustainable responses. That means creating real opportunities—access to land, livelihoods, markets and services—so people can feed themselves and their families, not just today, but well into the future."
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Israeli Blockade Leaves 1 Million Children in Gaza Without Basic Necessities 'Yet Again': UNICEF
"My children are crying at home from hunger and I have nothing to give them," said one mother. "I can't afford to buy what we need. There's simply no way to survive."
Mar 17, 2025
After a four-day mission to the West Bank and Gaza, a top official for the United Nations' children's welfare agency on Sunday described the effects that Israel's blockade on all humanitarian aid into the latter territory has had on roughly 1 million children in recent weeks, and demanded that lifesaving essentials—currently "stalled just a few dozen kilometers outside the Gaza Strip"—be allowed into the enclave.
Edouard Beigbeder, Middle East and North Africa regional director for the U.N. Children's Fund (UNICEF), said that during his most recent trip to Gaza he witnessed how "1 million children are living without the very basics they need to survive—yet again," following Israel's decision in early March to once again block all aid in a purported effort to pressure Hamas into accepting a U.S. hostage release plan.
The blocking of food, water, medications, and other essential supplies is a violation of "international humanitarian law," said Beigbeder.
"Civilians' essential needs must be met, and this requires facilitating the entry of lifesaving assistance whether or not there is a cease-fire in place," he said. "Any further delays to the entry of aid risk further slowing or shuttering essential services and could fast-reverse the gains made for children during the cease-fire."
Israel's blockade has left a water desalination plant in Khan Younis without electricity, allowing it to run at just 13% capacity and "depriving hundreds of thousands of people from drinkable water and sanitation services," said Beigbeder.
He particularly warned of the blockade's impact on some of Gaza's most vulnerable residents—premature newborns and children under the age of two who need access to lifesaving vaccines and medical equipment that have been languishing in delivery trucks just outside the Gaza Strip for two weeks.
UNICEF has managed to deliver 30 continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) machines to aid premature newborns with acute respiratory syndrome, but Beigbeder warned that "approximately 4,000 newborns are currently unable to access essential lifesaving care due to the major impact on medical facilities in the Gaza Strip."
"Every day without these ventilators, lives are lost, especially among vulnerable, premature newborns in the northern Gaza Strip," he said.
Beigbeder's warning came as the operator of 10 charity food kitchens in Gaza toldAl Jazeera that it has only been able to operate two distribution centers since Israel began blocking aid again following the cease-fire that began in January.
"We had 80 pots every day that we were serving to people," Omar Abuhammad, a coordinator with the Heroic Hearts organization, told the outlet. "Now we're working on about 20... As the main source of food for [people], we no longer have the ability to serve them."
Abuhammad said the organization had been able to serve about 40,000 Palestinians in Deir el-Balah each day before the newest blockade was imposed, but now it is only able to help 10,000 people daily.
Om Mahmoud, a displaced woman in Deir el-Balah, toldAl Jazeera that she "used to rely on this simple community kitchen for food, but now even they are struggling to feed us."
"My children are crying at home from hunger and I have nothing to give them," said Mahmoud. "I can't afford to buy what we need. There's simply no way to survive."
Beigbader said that on the four-day mission to the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and Gaza, "nearly all of the 2.4 million children" living there are being "affected in some way" by Israel's continued assaults.
"Some children live with tremendous fear or anxiety; others face the real consequences of deprivation of humanitarian assistance and protection, displacement, destruction, or death. All children must be protected," said Beigbader. "UNICEF continues to do everything we can to protect and support children in the state of Palestine. We are repairing water systems, running mental health sessions, setting up learning centers, and advocating constantly with decision makers for access and for the violence to cease. But this alone is not enough."
Israel has demanded the release of 11 living hostages captured by Hamas on October 7, 2023, in exchange for extending the cease-fire by 50 days and allowing aid into Gaza, but Hamas has objected to the U.S.-drafted proposal because it does not include a firm timeline for a permanent cease-fire.
As Israel has blocked humanitarian aid to pressure Hamas to accept the cease-fire extension, it has also launched strikes in Gaza, including a drone strike that killed three men who a witness in the Bureij refugee camp said were collecting firewood due to the lack of cooking gas stemming from the blockade.
Israel had claimed the men were planting roadside bombs.
A woman at the scene told Al Jazeera that "the young men were busy, not very far away from me, collecting firewood. But without warning, a missile hit them. Some other people were injured. We climbed a hill to try to help them, and we were shocked to see a quadcopter overhead. We are so terrified."
Hani Mahmoud ofAl Jazeera reported on Monday that "this is not the first time we're seeing this happen since the cease-fire began on January 19."
"Just now, a drone is hovering above in the western part of Gaza City," Mahmoud said. "It is buzzing and casting fear on the population. The streets have been emptied of people because of concerns over more attacks."
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