Two Years Too Long: UNRWA Documents Gaza’s Collapse under Israeli Siege

October 6, 2025 News
Israel continues to commit horrific massacres in Gaza. (Photo: via QNN)

By Palestine Chronicle Staff  

UNRWA warns that Gaza has been devastated by two years of genocidal war—tens of thousands killed, mass hunger, and a population pushed to the brink of survival amid total aid restrictions.

Nearly all of Gaza’s population has been displaced, many multiple times, according to a fact sheet released by UNRWA on the humanitarian consequences of the two years of Israel’s ongoing genocidal assault on the enclave.

With “over 66,000 reported killed”, the UN agency said, nearly 80 percent of structures have been damaged or destroyed across the Strip.

Over 370 UNRWA workers were killed, while nearly all UNRWA facilities “were impacted during the war and at least 845 people killed when sheltering in an UNRWA facility.”

Up to one million displaced Palestinians have been sheltered in UNRWA facilities during the past two years.

Nutrition and Food Security

According to UNWRA’s figures, there are 455 malnutrition-related deaths, including over 150 children. Gaza’s Ministry of Health announced on Sunday that the total death toll due to malnutrition is 460, including 154 children.

The UN agency said it “ran out of food at the end of April 2025”, while Israeli authorities have banned UNRWA from bringing in any humanitarian assistance, including food, since March 2, 2025.

The Agency “has enough food for the entire population for three months stuck outside Gaza.” It also noted that over 98 percent of cropland is “damaged, inaccessible, or both.”

Health, Impact on Medical Facilities

There have been over 790 attacks on health workers, patients, hospitals, and other medical infrastructure in Gaza, while “less than 40 percent of remain functional, all partially,” the agency noted.

The spread of infectious diseases include respiratory infections, acute watery diarrhea, scabies, and skin rashes. Cases of suspected meningitis, tuberculosis, and the rare Guillain-Barre Syndrome were reported.

Four out of 22 UNRWA health centers are operational as of October 2025, including three temporary health centers and around 30 medical points.

Since January 2024, over 277,100 children have been screened for malnutrition.

Water, Sanitation, Hygiene

Nearly 90 percent of the WASH (Water, Sanitation, Hygiene) sector assets were either destroyed or damaged.

Half a million women and girls lack sufficient menstrual hygiene materials, the figures indicated.

Over 60 percent of households lack access to soap, while over 40 percent of families live near uncollected waste.

Education

Nearly 660,000 children were forced out of school for the third year in a row, “half of them went to UNRWA schools,” the agency said.

Nearly 92 percent of school buildings “will either need full reconstruction or major rehabilitation to be functional again.”

Around 90 percent of UNRWA schools “were hit or damaged, many while sheltering displaced families.”

Over half a million children received psycho-social support activities.

‘Stream of Atrocities’ – HRW

Human Rights Watch (HRW) has criticized US President Donald Trump’s “Comprehensive Plan to End the Gaza Conflict,” announced on September 29, saying it “is no substitute for the urgent action governments need to take to protect civilians and support justice after two years of grave abuses in Israel and Palestine.”

“The two years since October 7, 2023, have brought a seemingly endless stream of atrocities against civilians for which there has been no letup or justice,” Omar Shakir, Israel and Palestine Director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement on Sunday.

He said governments “should not wait for the adoption of Trump’s or any other plan to take action to prevent further harm to those most at risk.”

Atrocity crimes over the past two years “have taken a devastating toll on civilians with thousands killed, maimed, starved, forcibly displaced, and unlawfully held hostage or detained; towns and neighborhoods leveled to the ground; and countless communities and lives devastated,”the organization stated.

‘Contempt for Obligations’ Under IHL

It stressed that the “scale of destruction in Gaza and the patterns of attacks have demonstrated the Israeli government’s contempt for its fundamental obligations under international law.”

The organization further noted that the “failure to uphold these norms has consequences that extend far beyond Israel and Palestine. When powerful states or their allies disregard international humanitarian law without consequence, they erode the credibility of the entire system and weaken protections for civilians in armed conflicts elsewhere.”

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HRW urged all governments “to act to prevent further atrocities and to uphold the universality of human rights,” including pressing the Israeli authorities to “immediately and unconditionally” lift unlawful sweeping restrictions on the entry of aid into Gaza.

In addition, to impose targeted sanctions, including travel bans and asset freezes, against Israeli officials and others credibly implicated in ongoing serious violations, as well as to suspend preferential trade agreements with Israel and ban trade with illegal settlements.

“The worsening repression on the ground as decades of ‘peace processes’ played out should have made clear the folly of relying solely on peace plans to address grave abuses,” Shakir said.

According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health on Monday, the total death toll since October 2023 has risen to 67,160 and 169,679 injuries.

(The Palestine Chronicle)

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