OCHA has warned that civilians in Gaza continue to face serious danger, with fresh attacks reported on schools and canvas classrooms.
UN Deputy Spokesperson Farhan Haq said humanitarian partners reported that Israeli forces shot at a tented classroom in Gaza City on Tuesday, injuring a Palestinian sixth-grade learner. “Today in Gaza City, our partners reported that a sixth-grade student was taken to the hospital after being hit by a bullet and injured in a tented classroom,” Haq said.
Haq said the incident forms part of a wider pattern of attacks affecting education facilities in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including Gaza and the West Bank. “We stress that under international humanitarian law, civilians and civilian infrastructure must be protected and should not be targeted,” Haq said.
“Learning spaces must remain safe and protected environments for both students and teachers,” Haq said.
The warning comes despite the October Israel-Hamas ceasefire that ended two years of war. Since the ceasefire, Israeli attacks have killed 1 209 people and injured 3 943 others in Gaza.
OCHA said humanitarian partners have mobilised support for families displaced after Israeli forces reportedly demolished homes and the last remaining school in a former four-school compound in Beit Lahia.
Tents sheltering nearly a dozen families were also reportedly destroyed.
Haq said Israeli forces placed new cement blocks nearby, marking a further expansion of restricted areas beyond the terms of the October ceasefire.
In the occupied West Bank, OCHA said more than 80 Palestinian schools are currently subject to demolition or related orders.
Israeli authorities also demolished parts of a school in the Masafer Yatta area of southern Hebron, where more than 1 000 Palestinian residents are under pressure to leave. “So far this year, our education partners have reached more than 60 000 students in the West Bank through remedial and catch-up learning programmes,” Haq said.
Education partners have rehabilitated 30 schools, provided transport and other protection support to more than 2 600 students and education personnel in high-risk areas, and delivered education-specific cash assistance, psychosocial support and legal aid.
Haq warned that funding for education and protection support remains critically low.
The UN has again stressed that civilians, schools and other civilian infrastructure must be protected under international humanitarian law.
–UN/ChannelAfrica–
