United Nations officials on Wednesday welcomed limited pauses in the fighting between Israel and Hamas to allow Polio vaccinations for children as rare moments of hope in the nearly year-long war in Gaza.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), 187,000 children in Gaza have been vaccinated against polio, with the target of 640,000. WHO and partners launched the campaign this week after Gaza recently reported its first case of polio in 25 years: a 10-month-old boy who is now paralyzed in one leg.
The boy’s mother, Neveen Abu El Jidyan, told CBS News in an interview Last week she said she had been unable to do much for her son, Abdul Rahman, since he contracted polio.
“We haven’t given him any treatment. We live in a tent and there is no medicine,” El Jidyan, 35, told CBS News on August 27.
“Abdul Rahman was supposed to get vaccinated on the first day of the war, and our house was targeted and his medical card was left at home,” she said. “Since we were traveling, I couldn’t get him the vaccine.”
Israel said the vaccination program would continue until Monday and last eight hours a day.
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The top U.N. peacekeeping and humanitarian officials spoke Wednesday at a meeting requested by Israel that was supported by its allies, France, Britain and the United States, permanent members of the Security Council that hold veto power. Israel’s ambassador Wednesday focused on the hostages taken in the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks on Israel that sparked the war and the recent killing of six prisoners.
Algeria, which sits on the UN Security Council until next year, also called for the UN body to meet to discuss the broader situation in the Palestinian territories.
Rosemary DiCarlo, the UN under-secretary-general for political and peacebuilding affairs, and Edem Wosornu, director of the Operations and Advocacy Division at the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, both spoke of the pauses in fighting caused by polio as rare glimmers of hope, as did representatives from France, Britain, the United States and other nations.
“It does not have to be this way. Indeed, in recent days, there have been signs that humanitarian goals can inspire positive action,” Wosornu told the Council.
“This vaccination campaign demonstrates that it is possible to enable humanitarian actors to act on the ground,” French Ambassador to the UN Nicolas de Rivière told the Council. “This must become the rule.”
Health officials have expressed concern about the spread of disease in the besieged territory as the war has created a humanitarian disaster, with people crammed into squalid tent camps and filthy sewage flowing through the streets.
Slovenian Ambassador Samuel Zbogar, who is presiding over the Security Council for September, told reporters on Tuesday that there was “growing anxiety within the council” about the situation in Syria. the absence of a ceasefire and an agreement to release the hostages to end the violence.
The Security Council approved a resolution in June endorsing a ceasefire plan to end the war, with Russia abstaining.
“It has to move, one way or another,” Zbogar said of getting the deal done or pursuing other options.
Hamas’ attacks on October 7 left about 1,200 people dead, mostly civilians, and about 250 people taken hostage. Israeli military retaliation left more than 40,000 Palestinians dead, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants in its count.
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