UNRWA Condemns Rafah School Shooting

UNRWA Press Release 2 June 2004
UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East-Headquarters Gaza
website:  http://www.unrwa.org
Press Release No. HQ/G/18/2004
2 June, 2004

UNRWA Condemns Rafah School Shooting

Gaza – The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) condemns in the strongest possible terms the violation of the sanctity of one of its schools in Rafah on Tuesday 1 June by Israeli tank fire.

At around 16:00hrs a tank stationed on sand dunes several hundred metres from UNRWA’s Al-Umariye Elementary Boys’ School opened fire on the Tel Es-Sultan district of Rafah. The school stands on the main road into Tel Es-Sultan. Several shots hit the school building and one hit the window frame of a second-floor classroom.

The bullet, or shrapnel from the window, entered the classroom where it struck two ten year old boys. One was lightly injured in the head. The second, Mahmoud Nathmey Hamad was struck in the neck. After being rushed to hospital he received emergency surgery. His condition is still serious, but is now improving.

UNRWA will protest this incident in the strongest possible terms to the Israeli authorities.

Peter Hansen, UNRWA’s Commissioner-General, said: “This is the second time in a little over a year that a child in a UN classroom has been struck by Israeli fire. Such indifference to the sanctity of schools and the UN flags flying above them violates all humanitarian norms and is absolutely deplorable. Israel’s military must take steps to investigate this incident and, if necessary, bring to justice those responsible.”

In March 2003 a then 12-year old pupil, Hoda Darwish, was hit in the head by a bullet fired from an Israeli observation post on the outskirts of Khan Younis. She was irreparably blinded by her injury.

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Public Information Office
UNRWA-HQ (GAZA)
website:  http://www.unrwa.org
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UNRWA Press Release 31 May 2004
UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East-Headquarters Gaza
website: www.unrwa.org
Press Release No. HQ/G/17/2004
31 May, 2004

UNRWA Launches $15.8 Million Crisis Appeal for Rafah

Jerusalem – The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) today launched an appeal to the international community for $15.84 million to meet the immediate needs of the people of Rafah. The appeal follows weeks of the most intense destruction in Gaza since the start of the intifada.

UNRWA needs the funds to provide emergency cash, food and housing assistance to the hundreds of families who have lost their homes, had a breadwinner killed or wounded, or who are in need of ongoing medical care.

Under this appeal UNRWA would provide cash assistance to 760 families who need urgent help coping with the aftermath of the latest Israeli incursions. UNRWA is the only place most of these people can turn to for help. The Agency requires $228,000 to fund this programme.

Included in this group are around 560 refugee families eligible to be re-housed under the Agency’s emergency shelter scheme. In the short term they will need grants to help with renting accommodation. This will amount to 672,000. In the longer term the Agency will need the funds to build new shelters. UNRWA estimates it needs almost $11.5 million to meet the permanent accommodation needs of these families. This also covers the repair of 244 shelters that sustained varying degrees of damage during the incursions.

As of May 30 a total of 21,142 people have now lost their homes in the Gaza Strip. UNRWA has been able to build new shelters for less than one third of them. To rehouse all of those still needing shelter in Gaza, UNRWA would need to receive $38.5 million.

UNRWA is currently providing daily meals to around 2,500 people taking shelter in three of its schools in Rafah. To provide for them for at least two more months, and to supply the homeless with new household equipment, will require a further $842,000. An additional $110,000 is needed to replenish the Agency’s medical stocks in Rafah and to provide wheelchairs and prosthetic devices for injured refugees.

UNRWA will also seek funds under this appeal to repair the damaged infrastructure of the Tel Es-Sultan quarter of Rafah where damage to sewage and water networks and other infrastructure poses a serious health hazard. The infrastructure component of this appeal will reach around $928,000. Additional funds will also be required to cover UNRWA’s operational costs.

Launching the appeal, Peter Hansen, UNRWA’s Commissioner-General, said: “In the hardest-hit place in the Gaza Strip there are few places to turn for assistance. Rafah was always a poor place. It is now a devastated place. Hundreds of destitute families are relying on UNRWA and the international community to come forward and help them cope with a very grave humanitarian crisis.”

The overwhelming majority of those affected in Rafah have been refugees registered with UNRWA. The Agency, which chairs the Operational Coordination Group of UN agencies, NGOs and Palestinian ministries, has formulated its appeal in coordination with the other main relief actors in the Gaza Strip.

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The text of this press release is available at  http://www.un.org/unrwa/news/releases/pr-2004/hqg17-04.pdf

Also visit  http://www.un.org/unrwa/emergency/appeals/rafah_appeal.pdf to get the full text of the Supplementary Appeal for Rafah

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Public Information Office
UNRWA-HQ (GAZA)
website:  http://www.unrwa.org