Today's top news: Occupied Palestinian Territory, Ukraine, Haiti, USG Griffiths
Occupied Palestinian Territory
Displaced families in Gaza continue to face dire conditions and significant challenges in accessing basic services. Additionally, according to recent assessments led by OCHA and humanitarian partners on 7 June, critically low access to water was reported as a key concern.
Israeli evacuation orders and military operations since early May have forced the displacement of more people.
The World Health Organization (WHO) says that it remains concerned about the escalating health crisis in the occupied Palestinian territory, including the West Bank, where attacks on health infrastructure and increased restrictions on movement are obstructing access to health care.
As of 28 May, WHO has documented 480 attacks on health care in the West Bank since 7 October 2023. They include attacks on health infrastructure and ambulances, detention of health workers and patients, obstruction of their access to health facilities, use of force on health workers and militarized searches of ambulances and staff.
The closure of checkpoints, arbitrary obstructions, and detentions of health workers, rising insecurity, as well as the siege and closure of entire towns and communities has made movement within the West Bank increasingly restricted, impeding access to health facilities.
Ukraine
Attacks and hostilities over the last four days across Ukraine continued to cause multiple civilian casualties, including among children.
The regions of Donetsk, Kharkiv and Poltava, in the east and the centre of the country, were particularly affected, with homes and civilian facilities been damaged, as well as disruptions to the power supply. That is according to the authorities and partners on the ground.
On 14 June, in the Sumy Region, in the country’s north-east, a bus operated by a national non-governmental organization came under an attack, which caused minor injuries to a driver and three passengers. The bus was part of a social transportation project, funded by the Ukraine Humanitarian Fund, which supports the residents in this region bordering the Russian Federation where there is no public transport.
Following the attack in the Poltava Region, which, according to the national authorities, injured more than 20 civilians, including children, humanitarian partners provided psychological support and delivered repair materials, reaching over 200 people.
Aid workers also distributed construction materials for emergency repairs to the affected families in the Donetsk, Kharkiv and Dnipro Regions whose homes were damaged by recent attacks.
Haiti
On Monday, 17 June, two cargo flights organized through the World Food Programme (WFP) landed in Haiti's Port-au-Prince, carrying 55 tons of medicine, shelter and hygiene materials, to be used to assist displaced people and to prepare for the hurricane season.
WFP has distributed some 30 million meals across the country since the start of 2023-2024 school year. Of these 30 million meals, nearly 17 million of them have been provided through a programme that supports local farmers.
The education sector has been severely impacted by the recent violence, with more than 200,000 schoolchildren and 4,000 teachers affected in the Ouest and Artibonite departments. Across the capital, 39 schools have ceased functioning as they have been transformed into displacement sites.
Since 8 June, UNICEF and the Haitian education ministry have started running classes and courses to compensate for missed classes over the past few months across 30 centers in Port-au-Prince.
Under-Secretary-General Martin Griffiths
In a guest essay published on Monday in the New York Times, the Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, Martin Griffiths, writes “I have spent much of my career in or on the edges of war zones, but nothing quite prepared me for the breadth and depth of human suffering I have witnessed in my three years as the United Nations’ humanitarian chief.”
The full essay is available in the New York Times.