DaysofPal – The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has warned that children in the Gaza Strip cannot be protected while “bombs continue to fall from the sky,” saying the ongoing conflict has shattered every aspect of childhood.
Speaking to Al Jazeera, UNICEF spokesperson Louise Wateridge said there is no safe childhood in Gaza and that concerns about child labor cannot be separated from the broader collapse of children’s lives under the ongoing humanitarian crisis.
“We are seeing children who should be in classrooms, on playgrounds, and with their families and friends,” Wateridge said. “Instead, they find themselves every day searching for food, water, and medicine simply to survive.”
She described even a single day under such conditions as “inhumane,” adding that children in Gaza have endured this reality day after day and month after month for more than two and a half years.
“Terror has become completely normalized,” she said.
Trauma Has Become Part of Childhood
Wateridge said UNICEF’s reports can no longer keep pace with the scale of suffering in Gaza.
“Every time we write or report about children who have been killed or injured, another atrocity unfolds within hours,” she said, adding that such incidents continue even during ceasefire periods.
According to the UNICEF spokesperson, trauma has become woven into the very fabric of childhood in Gaza, with children trapped in an unending cycle of displacement, hunger, fear, illness, death, and uncertainty.
“These children need protection, and they need their homes,” she said.
Wateridge stressed that children cannot be protected while bombs continue to fall, nor can they return to school when schools have been destroyed, security is absent, and essential resources remain severely limited.
She said UNICEF continues to do everything possible to support children and families in Gaza but emphasized that humanitarian assistance alone is insufficient.
“The population is now confined to just 40 percent of the Gaza Strip,” she said. “The health situation has deteriorated so severely that rats are biting children while they sleep at night.”
Wateridge stressed that no humanitarian response can substitute for the safety children need, an end to the violence, the unrestricted flow of humanitarian aid, and the restoration of life-saving services.
“Gaza’s children need to have their childhood returned to them,” she said.
Heavy Toll on Children and Education
According to the Information Unit of Gaza’s Ministry of Health, 21,638 children have been killed during the war, accounting for nearly 30 percent of the total death toll. More than 45,000 children have also been injured, including around 1,000 who have suffered limb amputations.
Figures released by the Palestinian Ministry of Education through April 20 show that 19,061 students have been killed and 28,337 injured since the start of the war. The ministry also reported the deaths of 801 educational staff members and injuries to 3,291 others.
In addition, 179 government schools have been destroyed, while 105 schools operated by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) have been damaged by bombardment and destruction.
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