Capitals: Europe and the Arabs
An 11-member delegation from the 15-member UN Security Council, as well as representatives of four other countries, visited the Egyptian cities of Al-Arish and Rafah on Monday, where humanitarian aid is delivered to the Gaza Strip through the Rafah crossing. According to what was stated in the United Nations daily news bulletin, a copy of which we received on Thursday morning
Vanessa Fraser, Malta's Permanent Representative to the United Nations, who was part of the delegation, said that they spoke to some patients at Al-Arish Hospital, and some children being treated there.
She added to UN news that she and the delegation visited the water desalination plant that the United Arab Emirates is installing just outside the borders of Rafah, in order to produce 600,000 gallons of desalinated water for the benefit of Gaza every day.
She added that the delegation was supposed to be allowed to enter Gaza and travel four kilometers across the border to visit the field hospital, which was established by the UAE.
“It was especially important for me to visit the hospital because it was one of the projects established during the humanitarian truce,” she said, noting that the hospital was a “tangible result” of Resolution 2712 submitted by Malta and adopted by the Security Council last month.
However, they reported that the visit to the Gaza Strip did not take place after they were informed by the Israeli forces that approval had been withdrawn due to the ongoing military operations there. She said that Egypt and the UAE organized a video meeting for the delegation with doctors and patients in the field hospital.
Fraser indicated that the Security Council must insist on the implementation of Resolution No. 2712, which calls for the establishment of urgent truces and humanitarian corridors extending throughout the Gaza Strip and the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages.
The delegation received statements from representatives of the Egyptian government, the Egyptian, Palestinian, and Emirati Red Crescent Societies, the Palestinian Ministry of Health, Doctors Without Borders, and UNRWA, in addition to the United Nations Coordinator for Humanitarian Affairs in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, and the United Nations Resident Coordinator in Egypt.
The delegation visited the Rafah border crossing, Al-Arish General Hospital to meet the wounded Palestinians who were evacuated and receiving medical treatment there, and the main logistical center of the Egyptian Red Crescent Society.
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Egypt stated: “For more than two months, and thanks to the efforts made by the Egyptian authorities and the Egyptian Red Crescent Society, humanitarian aid has reached Gaza through the Rafah crossing, which is the only lifeline for Gaza at the present time.”
The office indicated that Egypt has allocated Al-Arish International Airport in North Sinai Governorate to receive international humanitarian aid to Gaza since the beginning of the crisis.
“This is a war like no other. It is a war of an extremely terrifying scope. And it is the civilians in Gaza who are bearing the brunt of it,” said Gemma Connell of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs from Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, who painted a bleak picture of the situation of civilians, especially women. And children in the sector. According to her statements to United Nations news
Connell, who is visiting Gaza on a humanitarian mission after working there before, said that the children in the Strip are traumatized and many of them have gone through successive wars. She also touched on the health situation, as the few hospitals that are still operating suffer from overcrowding and lack of supplies, in addition to being targeted.
She said that although the majority of UNRWA employees have become displaced, they are still performing “heroic, sincere work” in serving their community.