Israel refuses to renew visa of head of UN OCHA agency in Palestine

Israel refused to extend Andrea De Domenico's visa because of his report showing an alarming increase in its violations against children

World

2 min read

The New Arab Staff

02 August, 2024

Teams from the health department, civil defence, crime scene investigation, forensics and United Nations (UN) officials carry out investigation at the scene after Israeli siege and attacks that completely destroyed Gaza's Al-Shifa Hospital [Getty]

Israel has refused to renew the visa of the UN humanitarian office chief in the occupied Palestinian Territory, the head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said.

"In my case, specifically, I was given recently a one-month extension, and I was warned that would not be renewed beyond this one month," Andrea De Domenico said in a virtual news conference.

"The straw that broke the camel’s back is the publication of the ‘Children and Armed Conflict Report’ from the UN, and they alluded to the long-standing issue of reporting that OCHA has been doing," he added.

De Domenico added that there has been no formal communication with Israeli authorities despite their repeated requests.

The report De Domenico said has angered Israeli authorities was published in June and shows a significant rise in violations against children in 2023.

The report highlights that since the start of Israel’s war on Gaza, there have been grave violations against children in Israel and occupied Palestinian territories, which have increased by 155 percent.

It also names Israel and its security forces on a list of those "that commit grave violations affecting children in situations of armed conflict."

De Domenico questioned "how much human suffering can be tolerated in the name of security" and said that humanity is "becoming immune to horror" in reference to Gaza.

He added that there is a "systematic dehumanisation of civilians in Gaza and the West Bank," since the start of the war, adding that the rhetoric incites violence.

"What is our credibility as the UN as the international community? When we will try to promote international humanitarian law, and human rights in other places, in other contexts, after this dark page that we are witnessing in Gaza," he said.

The report comes as around 1.9 million people in Gaza have now been forcibly displaced because of Israel’s ongoing onslaught.

Over 572 Palestinians in the occupied West Bank have also been killed in the same time frame, including 141 children, with thousands more detained and abused while in detention.

The war on the besieged Gaza Strip has killed at least 39,480 Palestinians and wounded over 91,000 others. It has also utterly devastated the Strip’s infrastructure, plunging it into a deep humanitarian crisis and bringing it to the verge of famine.