Save the Children

In response to a temporary humanitarian pause to allow aid into Gaza, Save the Children warns that only a permanent and unconditional ceasefire can truly save children’s lives.

Ahmad Alhendawi, Save the Children’s Regional Director for the Middle East, Eastern Europe and North Africa, said: “Any increase in the entry of aid via land crossings has the potential to help people survive, primarily children, thousands of whom are otherwise facing their final days after nearly five months of total siege on the entry of all assistance. But just how lifesaving these pauses will be depends on how long they continue and the extent to which Israeli authorities facilitate safe and logistically feasible conditions for the delivery of assistance to starving children and families.

“The stage of malnutrition and starvation many people across Gaza are facing means one or even a few days of food aid will not be enough to bring them back from the brink of death. Malnutrition can be prevented, malnutrition can be treated – and we know how to do it. Malnourished people, especially children, need sustained access to diverse food, nutrition supplements, and sometimes specialist medical care, to reverse the damage that can be undone.

“This step is also too late for the 133 people, including 87 children, who have died due to malnutrition and starvation since October 2023 according to the Ministry of Health. Of those 87 children, at least seven have died in the last five days.

“Humanitarian organizations like Save the Children will do everything they can to ensure the aid entering Gaza reaches and saves the lives of children and families. But a temporary pause is not enough to make that happen. We need a definitive ceasefire and re-establishment of the conditions for the humanitarian system to work at full scale and pace as it is ready to do. Otherwise, the children saved today may not live to see tomorrow.

“So long as it is not definitive, any pause offers the people of Gaza a glimmer of hope just to replace it with further horrors – remember the conduct of hostilities has typically intensified between such pauses, and siege conditions were imposed after the last pause ended, directly resulting in the starvation we see sweeping the Strip today. A temporary pause is psychological torment for a population who have faced relentless violent mental harm for nearly two years, dangling their survival in front of them in increasing weaponization of aid and humanitarian access.”