UN Agency Chiefs say 88 UN staff have been killed since the war between Israel and Hamas began last month
The heads of 18 UN organizations including UNICEF and the World Health Organization said this in a joint statement late Sunday.
“For almost a month, the world has been watching the unfolding situation in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory in shock and horror at the spiralling numbers of lives lost and torn apart,”
Scores of aid workers have been killed since October 7 including 88 UNRWA colleagues — the highest number of United Nations fatalities ever recorded in a single conflict,” they said, referring to the UN relief and works agency for Palestinian refugees.
During the last heavy conflict in Gaza between Israel and Hamas, in 2014, 11 UNRWA staff were killed.
The agency chiefs expressed revulsion at the toll on both sides since the October 7 cross-border attack by Hamas Palestinian militants from Gaza into Israel, which left about 1,400 people dead, mainly civilians, Israeli authorities say.
Israel has retaliated with relentless air and artillery strikes that have killed at least 10,000 people, most of them civilians,
The UNRWA currently employs some 13,000 staff in the Gaza Strip, a besieged territory that is home to 2.4 million people.