New York: Europe and the Arabs

Thousands of Gazans continued to flee intensifying hostilities in Khan Yunis towards the densely populated southern city of Rafah, which UN humanitarian workers described as a “pressure cooker of despair,” the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said.
Jens Laerke, spokesman for the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, said that in recent days “thousands of Palestinians have fled to Rafah in the south, which already hosts more than half of Gaza’s population of about 2.3 million people,” according to the UN daily news bulletin.
At the bi-weekly press conference of UN agencies in Geneva, Laerke reiterated deep concerns that there is no safe place in Gaza amid reports of Israeli bombing around Rafah on Friday.
He added that most of the new arrivals "are living in temporary buildings, tents, or in the open. Rafah is now a pressure vessel of despair, and we fear what will happen next." According to the World Health Organization, so far, there are 100,000 people in Gaza who are dead, wounded, or missing and are believed to have died as a result of air strikes and fighting on the ground between Israeli soldiers and Palestinian militants.
The organization reported that 60% of the 27,019 deaths reported by health authorities in Gaza were women and children, with more than 66,000 people infected and requiring difficult-to-access medical care.
hard mission
Highlighting the “extremely difficult” task of resupplying hospitals and medical centers across the Strip, WHO Representative in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Dr. Rick Pepperkorn, explained that it is among 15 planned missions to the northern Gaza Strip in January. /January, three of them were implemented, four were inaccessible due to impassable roads, one was postponed, and eight missions were rejected.
Dr. Pepperkorn added in the press conference in Geneva via video, speaking from Jerusalem, that of the 11 missions that were planned to the south last month, four of them were implemented, two were postponed, and the arrival of two was hindered either due to the delay in opening checkpoints or due to the prolonged delay. Meanwhile, permits for three missions were refused.
The UN official said that the lack of safety guarantees and humanitarian corridors in Gaza makes it more difficult to carry out humanitarian operations safely and quickly, adding that "the lack of sustained access to hospitals could lead to the dismantling of the health system."
Discussion in the Security Council
US Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield said that her country is working with Qatar, Egypt and other regional partners to develop a strong proposal to create conditions to move forward on the path to resolving the current conflict.
Speaking to reporters, she said that the Security Council bears the responsibility of ensuring that any action taken in the coming days will increase pressure on Hamas to accept this proposal. She stated that the Algerian draft resolution presented to the Council members does not achieve that goal. “On the contrary, this draft may jeopardize sensitive negotiations and obstruct intensive diplomatic efforts to secure the release of the hostages and reach a prolonged truce that Palestinian civilians and aid workers desperately need.”
She said that this proposal, once approved and implemented, would bring the parties closer to creating conditions for a sustainable cessation of hostilities. She stressed the need for the Security Council to support the two humanitarian resolutions it had already adopted before.
She said this means focusing efforts on supporting the Chief Humanitarian and Gaza Reconstruction Coordinator, who this week reviewed the steps the United Nations intends to take to expand and accelerate aid delivery. “We cannot afford to undermine their efforts or the sensitive negotiations currently underway,” she said.
She added that the success of these efforts requires that the United Nations be able to expand aid delivery. She pointed to the vital role played by UNRWA in this field, and stressed the need for an urgent and comprehensive investigation by the United Nations and an independent external review by a non-UN agency of UNRWA, including the serious allegations of the participation of a number of agency employees in the October 7 attacks and other related issues. Link.