"UN: Gaza home to largest number of amputee children in modern history"

"Each day 10 children are losing 1 or both of their legs"

It is absolutely tragic however, disturbingly not surprising, that there are more amputee children in Gaza asa result of Israel’s genocidal attacks on Palestine than at at time before in modern history.

The following is a reposting of an article on about this as published by the Middle East Monitor.

UN: Gaza home to largest number of amputee children in modern history

In a statement to the UN General Assembly, Lisa Doughten from OCHA warned of the dire humanitarian situation in the occupied West Bank and Gaza, saying the besieged Strip 'is home to the largest cohort of child amputees in modern history'. ‘Each day 10 children are losing 1 or both of their legs,' she said, adding that women are 3 times more likely to suffer miscarriages as a result of Israel's bombing campaign.

October 11, 2024 at 2:11 pm • Middle East Monitor

Gaza is home to the largest number of amputee children in modern history, a senior UN official told the Security Council on Wednesday.

Director of the Financing and Partnerships Division of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), Lisa Doughten, said women and children are hard-hit by the trauma of the war and each day ten children are losing one or both of their legs.

“Gaza is home to the largest cohort of child amputees in modern history,” she said, also noting that women there are three times more likely to miscarry or die from childbirth. “We cannot claim ignorance to what is happening — nor can we afford to look away,” she emphasised, repeating calls for the Council and Member States to act, adding: “These atrocities must end.”

She warned that the systematic and permanent targeting of the health sector has deprived more than two million people in the Gaza Strip of receiving basic health services, where more than 50,000 pregnant women are deprived of maternity care.

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Also see the following article published by the Middle East Monitor.

UNICEF chief warns Gaza kids face 'post-generational challenges'

Injured Palestinians, including children, are brought to al-Ahli Baptist Hospital for treatment after Israeli attack on Gaza City, Gaza on September 29, 2024. [Dawoud Abo Alkas – Anadolu Agency]

After a year of military operations between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, the head of UNICEF warned that children there will face “post-generational challenges” due to the conflict, Reuters reports.

“If you look at Gaza really through the eyes of a child, it is a hellscape,” UNICEF’s executive director Catherine Russell told CBS News’ “Face the Nation” on Sunday, noting the toll of family deaths and displacements, as well as ongoing lack of food and clean water.

“They are so traumatized by what’s happening,” Russell said of the kids. “Even if we can get more supplies in there, the trauma that these children are suffering is going to have lifetime and even post-generational challenges for them.”

Russell said it remains “very dangerous” to move humanitarian aid in Gaza. However, she credited her organization with a “success story” of vaccinating thousands of children for polio in the area.

On the latest Israeli military operations in Lebanon targeting Iran-backed group Hezbollah, the UNICEF director said “the speed and intensity is shocking” and that “it makes it challenging for us” to reach the approximately 1 million displaced people there.

“I feel confident at this point that we can meet the needs but it is taking a tremendous amount of effort on our part to do it,” Russell said.

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It is now the year 2025 and the Ceasefire has begun.

What about all of the children who have been and still are being held in tyrannical arbitrary “Administrative Detention” by Israel indefinitely?

Detention without charge of Palestinian children hits record level

By Fayha' Shalash • The Electronic Intifada • 16 January 2025

Israel often areas children while carrying out military raids in the occupied West Bank. Mohammed NasserAPA images

The Sahweil family are still in a state of shock months after their home was raided by Israeli troops.

In August, they found themselves surrounded by military vehicles. Dozens of soldiers invaded the home, demanding to see Ammar Sahweil, who is only 14.

Once they found Ammar, the Israeli soldiers handcuffed and blindfolded him, informing him that he was under arrest. The soldiers also beat Ammar before his parents and siblings.

“We never expected all this intrusion,” Subhi Sahweil – Ammar’s father – said.

The Israelis took Ammar away from the family’s home in the occupied West Bank village of Abwein.

One week later, the family learned that Ammar had been placed in administrative detention – imprisonment without charge or trial. He remains imprisoned.

All files against people subject to administrative detention are kept secret. Lawyers representing detainees are, therefore, unable to see those files.

The number of children held in administrative detention rose from six in early 2023 to 85 in September 2024. Data compiled by Defence for Children International-Palestine show that Israel’s use of administrative detention against minors reached a record level over recent months.

“Arbitrary and tyrannical”

Ayed Abu Eqtaish from DCI-Palestine noted that administrative detention orders are issued by a military authority. Israel’s military court system in the West Bank, he said, is “arbitrary and tyrannical.”

While Israel allows judicial reviews of detention orders from military commanders, “in more than 99 percent of cases, administrative detention orders are confirmed,” Abu Eqtaish said.

The increase in administrative detention has taken place at a time when Israel – following an agenda set by Itamar Ben-Gvir, the far-right national security minister – has made conditions harsher for Palestinian prisoners.

Mawid al-Hajj from the West Bank city of Jericho had been placed in administrative detention during May 2023. He was then among the prisoners released as part of an agreement that briefly paused Israel’s genocidal war against Gaza in late November that year.

In February 2024, Mawid was once again arrested and placed in administrative detention by Israeli forces. He was 17 at that time.

Mawid had been shot in the leg by Israeli soldiers during confrontations with Palestinian youths a few weeks before his arrest in May 2023. He was arrested after the forces of occupation summoned him for interrogation.

“I didn’t expect [the questioning] would end with his arrest because he was wounded,” said Amal, Mawid’s mother.

Mawid told his family that he had been subjected to electric shocks following his arrest.

He continued to have leg and back pain – effects of being shot and tortured – when he was again jailed in February 2024. The administrative detention order issued against him was renewed six months later.

When she learned that Mawid had been detained last year, “my heart broke,” Amal, his mother, said.

“His education has been disrupted and his health is declining,” Amal said. “And they still want to keep him in prison without charge.”

Laith Kmeil was arrested by Israeli forces during November 2023. The Israelis destroyed his family’s furniture as they stormed their home.

Both Laith and his friend Ahmad Assaf were beaten by Israeli soldiers and arrested.

According to Laith’s uncle Mujahid, the Palestinian Authority – which carries out “security coordination” with Israel – had called Laith into questioning before he was arrested. The PA had pressured him into signing a pledge that he would not confront Israel’s forces of occupation.

Two days later, Israel arrested him.

Laith, now aged 17, is being held under administrative detention in Israel’s Megiddo prison. A lawyer has only been permitted to visit him there once.

The lack of information about Laith is adding to his family’s anguish. “We don’t know anything about him,” said Mujahid, his uncle, “except that he is in the section for children in Megiddo prison.”

Fayha’ Shalash is a journalist based in the occupied West Bank.

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The apartheid state of Palestine imposed by Zionist extremists, must end.