{"id":312535,"date":"2025-10-26T16:19:53","date_gmt":"2025-10-26T20:19:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/?post_type=document&p=312535"},"modified":"2025-10-27T16:20:18","modified_gmt":"2025-10-27T20:20:18","slug":"unicef-statement-26oct25","status":"publish","type":"document","link":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/document\/unicef-statement-26oct25\/","title":{"rendered":"Gaza\u2019s ceasefire offers a vital chance for children – it must be seized – UNICEF"},"content":{"rendered":"

 <\/p>\n

26 October 2025<\/p>\n

Statement by UNICEF Middle East and North Africa Regional Director Edouard Beigbeder<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cTwo weeks ago, the start of the latest ceasefire in the Gaza Strip delivered long-awaited relief for families, where it offers a vital chance for the survival, safety and dignity of children.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe conversations I had in the Gaza Strip during the last week all echoed the same message \u2013 the\u00a0ceasefire must hold and it must deliver more than calm, it must deliver action.<\/p>\n

\u201cIsraeli military operations in the Gaza Strip have resulted in wholesale devastation. \u00a0Words and numbers alone cannot convey the scale of the impact on children that I saw – an impact that will last for generations. Children have endured unimaginable suffering; more\u00a0than 64,000 children have reportedly been killed or injured and more than 58,000 have lost a parent during the conflict. Entire cities have been flattened and critical systems destroyed. One million children have endured the daily horrors of surviving in the world\u2019s most dangerous place to be a child, leaving them with wounds of fear, loss and grief.<\/p>\n

\u201cUNICEF\u2019s humanitarian scale-up following the ceasefire is underway. We are racing against the clock to save children\u2019s lives from preventable threats, like malnutrition, disease and the winter cold. We are expanding nutrition treatment in the face of famine, trucking safe water to families in their places of refuge and equipping them with blankets, clothes and shelter.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn Tuesday, I met 8-month-old Hoor, who has severe acute malnutrition. Through UNICEF-provided treatments, she is recovering, and cash assistance is helping her family afford food in local markets.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have also started supporting local partners to begin repairing and rebuilding Gaza\u2019s essential services. These lifesaving systems must be revived and sustained. This means rebuilding and re-equipping health facilities with the staff, spaces and tools they need to save lives, resuming routine immunization, repairing community water networks, restoring energy supply to critical infrastructure, training local partners to prevent disease and malnutrition, expanding cash-for-work programmes for youth, and much more.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe importance of restoring education in this early recovery work cannot be overstated. After two lost years, families know that a return to proper education will provide a foundation for learning, healing, hope, and long-term social cohesion in their communities.<\/p>\n

\u201cUNICEF succeeded in bringing more than 100,000 children back to face-to-face learning during the war and now aims, together with education partners, to return all 650,000 school-age children to school.<\/p>\n

\u201cUNICEF is assembling semi-permanent classrooms and repairing damaged schools as we prepare to rebuild inclusive schools that combine multiple services under one roof \u2013 from safe drinking water to integrated mental health and psychosocial support and child protection services to promote emotional recovery and safety, for every child.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe long road to recovery is already being paved by Palestinian families \u2013 with the support of the international community \u2013 but certain commitments must be upheld, urgently, to accelerate and expand this critical work.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have seen an increase in the amount of UNICEF aid allowed into the Gaza Strip since the ceasefire, but it is not yet sufficient.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe call for the safe, rapid and unimpeded movement of humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip and for\u00a0Israeli authorities to enable this by:<\/p>\n