Friday morning, the Israeli government gave the 1.1 million people in Gaza who live north of the Wadi Gaza river — including all of Gaza City— a deadline of midnight tonight local time (21:00 UTC)— only 24 hours — to move south, amidst indications that an Israeli ground invasion may begin soon. Over the course of this past week, Israeli troops and tanks have amassed at the Gaza border, and today the Israeli military reported that it has already carried out small raids into Gaza to battle Hamas militants.
As several UN agencies are warning, the evacuation order is impossible to meet. The Gaza population is already suffering from the humanitarian disaster caused by Israel’s cutoff of food, water, electricity and medical supplies to the enclave in response to Hamas’s surprise attack on Israel on Oct. 7. Today, the World Health Organization called for immediate humanitarian access to the Gaza Strip, warning that Israel’s blockade and bombardment have left Gaza’s health system at “a breaking point.”
Under these circumstances, the UN said, a mass evacuation would result in “devastating humanitarian consequences.” The UN is urging that the Israeli order be rescinded before what is now a tragedy becomes “a calamitous situation.” According to the latest reports from the Palestinian Health Ministry, 1,900 Gaza residents have died from Israeli bombings, of whom 614 are children and 370 women. There are 7,696 wounded.
