More than 200 days of war have taken an unimaginable toll on children in the Gaza Strip: over 14,000 have been killed and 12,000 wounded; 1,750 are missing. In October, families were ordered to evacuate and take shelter in Rafah in southern Gaza, swelling the city's population from 250,000 to 1.2 million. Now Rafah itself is under attack, placing the lives of 600,000 children at risk. On May 7, Israeli forces seized control of Rafah's vital border crossing, jeopardizing humanitarian aid deliveries that children rely on for survival.
“Rafah is a city of children," UNICEF spokesperson James Elder said in a Palais des Nations briefing in Geneva on May 7. “If we define safety – as international humanitarian law says we must – as freedom from bombardment, as well as access to safe water, sufficient food, shelter and medicine – then there is nowhere safe on the Gaza strip to go to."
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