Months of unrelenting fighting and deprivation in Gaza have left thousands of children dead, while those who survive face continued war, siege, hunger and unimaginable loss.
Gaza’s children desperately need a lasting ceasefire to stop the violence. But they also need your continued support: please donate to our Emergency Fund.
Save the Children has already supplied essentials into Gaza, but the lack of food, water, and medicine is making survival nearly impossible: nearly all children in Gaza are at imminent risk of famine. And after over four months of siege and bombing, children's mental health in Gaza is being pushed beyond breaking point.
Our Emergency Fund allows us to respond wherever and whenever we're needed most. It allows us to respond, so we can reach children immediately and help them survive.
We've distributed food parcels, water, hygiene products and recreational kits to families in Gaza through local partners.
We have also started to provide mental health and psychosocial support to children and their families and we’re delivering cash to families to help them to buy essentials.
In Egypt, we’re supporting hospitals and ambulances to receive medical evacuees from Gaza, including assistance for premature babies, and we’re training frontline staff on child safeguarding as well as mental health and psychosocial support.
We are ready to scale up our response as soon as it's possible to do so, but we can't do this while the fighting continues.
We are calling for an immediate and definitive ceasefire so a full scale up of aid can get into Gaza to stop starvation, dehydration and disease.
This response will include:
- distributing more essential supplies, such as water, food, toiletries, cooking utensils, and other household essentials
- delivering further Mental Health and Psychosocial Support services for children and caregivers
- setting up child friendly spaces so children have a safe space to play and recover
- distributing warm clothes and blankets, as well as more cash and vouchers so families can buy food, medicines and any other essentials.
- providing fuel and water infrastructure for hospitals and distributing water storage tanks
- ensuring children continue to have access to education, by setting up temporary learning spaces and repairing damaged schools
- identifying the most at-risk children for referrals to protection related services
- deploying our Emergency Health Unit and procuring essential medical equipment
We're also responding to growing needs in the West Bank and Lebanon, and gearing up our teams across the region to prepare for any rise in children's needs as the situation evolves.
But we can’t do it without your help. Please donate now.
Save the Children condemns the killing of civilians, including children. The killing and maiming of children, along with attacks on schools and hospitals, is a grave violation, and those responsible should be held to account for their actions.
All sides must make every effort to protect the lives of children in the latest outbreak of fighting. All children captured must be released immediately and unconditionally. Civilians, and infrastructure essential for their lives, such as hospitals and schools, must be spared from the violence.
Children are terrified, have been forced from their homes, and are cut off from an education. If violence escalates further, children’s lives and futures will be the inevitable cost. The only way to truly protect children’s lives is to halt this violence.
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