GAZA, (PIC)
The Israeli occupation forces kill an average of four Palestinian children every hour in the war-torn Gaza Strip, according to recent Palestinian official statistics.
According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, there are more than 14,350 child martyrs, constituting 44 percent of the total number of martyrs (over 33,000) in Gaza.
Additionally, women and children constituted 70 percent of the missing persons in Gaza as a result of the Israeli aggression, totaling 7,000 individuals, while 43,349 children live in Gaza without one or both of their parents.
In a related context, James Elder, spokesman for the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), has said that more than 600,000 children in Rafah, south of Gaza, suffer from hunger and fear, and are facing the risk of an Israeli attack.
“Rafah is a city for children. There are 600,000 boys and girls, yet they are under threat of military assault, trapped in Rafah, with no safe place to go,” Elder stated.
On its X platform, UNICEF published a video of its spokesman talking about the suffering of children trying to survive in Rafah under Israeli attacks after 1.5 million displaced people were told by the Israeli army to go there.
Elder pointed out that Palestinian parents try every day to give hope to their children despite fear and hunger, stressing that the word “hope” is at risk of being deleted from the dictionary in Gaza.
He called on everyone who feels the pain and fear of Gazan parents towards their children and everyone who believes in childhood to stop this suffering in Rafah.
