UN Secretary General Demands Immediately Evacuation Of 2,500 High-Risk Gaza Children Died

Victims of Israeli attacks on Gaza October 2023. (Wikimedia Commons/Palestinian News & Information Agency (Wafa) in contact with APAimages)

JAKARTA - United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Thursday demanded that 2,500 children be evacuated from the Gaza Strip, Palestine for medical treatment, after meeting with four US doctors who said they were at high risk of dying in the coming weeks.

The four doctors volunteered in Gaza during the 15-month war between Israel and Palestinian militant Hamas, which has devastated the pocket area of more than 2 million people and its health care system.

Days before the ceasefire began on January 19, the World Health Organization (WHO) said more than 12,000 patients were awaiting medical evacuation and hoped it could be improved during the ceasefire.

Among the patients in dire need of treatment, there are 2,500 children, said Feroze Sidhwa, a California trauma surgeon who worked in Gaza from March 25 to April 8 last year.

"There are about 2,500 children who are at high risk of dying in the next few weeks. Some are dying now. Some will die tomorrow. Some will die the day after tomorrow," Sidhwa told reporters after meeting with Secretary General Guterres.

"Of the 2,500 children, most require very simple action," he said, referring to the case of a 3-year-old boy suffering from burns to his arm.

The burns have healed, but the scar tissue is slowly stopping the flow of blood, so it risks being amputated, said Sidhwa.

Ayesha Khan, an emergency doctor at Stanford University Hospital who worked in Gaza from late November to 1 January, revealed that many children were amputated, who did not have prosthetics or rehabilitation.

He lifted a photo of two young amputees, who shared wheelchairs. They became orphans in the attack that injured them.

"The only chance they have to survive is to be evacuated medically," Khan said.

"Unfortunately, current security restrictions do not allow children to travel with more than one caregiver," he continued.

"Their customer is their aunt, who has the baby she is breastfeeding," he said

"So even though we managed, with difficulty, prepared evacuations for them, they did not allow the aunt to carry her baby. So, the aunt had to choose between the baby she was breastfeeding and the lives of her two nephews," he said.

The doctors said they advocated a centralized process for medical evacuation with clear guidelines.

"Based on this ceasefire agreement, there should be a mechanism for medical evacuation. We still haven't seen the process described," said Thaer Ahmad, an ER doctor from Chicago, who worked in Gaza in January 2024.

Khan mengatakan, tidak ada proses yang berlaku untuk mengeluarkan anak-anak itu, serta menambahkan: "Dan apakah mereka akan diizinkan untuk kembali? Ada beberapa diskusi sekarang tentang pembukaan perbatasan Rafah hanya untuk pintu keluar, tetapi itu adalah pintu keluar tanpa hak hak untuk kembali."

Secretary General Guterres in turn said he was "deeply touched" by his meeting with American doctors on Thursday.

"2,500 children must be evacuated immediately with assurances that they will be able to return to their families and communities," Secretary General Guterres wrote on X after the meeting.

Separately, COGAT, Israel's Palestinian-related defense agency, did not respond to requests for comment on Guterres' request for medical evacuation of 2,500 children and the doctors he met.

Meanwhile, Israel's mission at the United Nations also did not respond to requests for comment.

Earlier this month, before the ceasefire, the WHO said 5,383 patients had been evacuated with their support since the war began in October 2023.

Most of them were evacuated in the first seven months before the Rafah crossing between Egypt and Gaza closed.