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UN PhotoUNFPA / GAZA RAFAH DIAPER FACTORY
STORY: UNFPA / GAZA RAFAH DIAPER FACTORY
TRT: 04:46
SOURCE: UNFPA
RESTRICTIONS: CREDIT UNFPA ON SCREEN CLEARLY VISIBLE
LANGUAGES: ARABIC / NATS
DATELINE: 28 FEBRUARY 2024, HANDMADE DIAPER FACTORY, RAFAH, GAZA
1.Med, people checking diapers
2.Wide, diaper factory workers and boxes of diapers
3.Med, woman sewing diapers
4.Close up, woman sewing
5.Wide, two men sewing
6.Closeup, a man sewing
7.Wide, people sewing
8.Wide, people making diapers
9.Med, Khalida Jamal Yassin making diapers
10. SOUNDBITE(Arabic) Khalida Jamal Yassin, displaced person, diaper factory worker: “Mothers, when they suffered from the unavailability of diapers, they turned to using strips or plastic diapers. Many suffer from the lack of water, there's no clean water for bathing and changing.”
11.SOUNDBITE(Arabic) Khalida Jamal Yassin: “And then, I mean, thank God, the idea of making diapers is very good because many women suffer from the absence of diapers. So, we made it as an alternative to assist them. And thank God, the idea was very nice, and people accepted it. Then, I mean, we sell the diaper for one shekel, which makes it affordable for everyone here. For all of Rafah. 1.5 million displaced people in Rafah, now, and the demand for diapers is unbelievably high.”
12.Wide, factory worker and boxes of diapers
13.Med, a box of diaper
14.Closeup, sewing
15.Wide, two women sewing
16.Med, a woman making diaper
17.Wide, a woman cutting materials
18.Med, cutting materials
19.Med, cutting materials
20.SOUNDBITE(Arabic) Khalida Jamal Yassin: “As you see, we're unable to fulfill the high demand, now we're producing around 1000 pieces per day. The entire daily production is sold out on the same day, and we start fresh with a new batch for the following day and so on.“
21.SOUNDBITE(Arabic) Khalida Jamal Yassin:” Let me tell you how we makeshift most of the raw materials. Can you see this coverall? We use the Covid coveralls. We brought it; it's a very good idea, you know. We extract the elastic bands from it so that we can provide for the diapers. We extract this elastic band, this one. This one.”
22.Med, a piece of coverall
23.Closeup, making diapers
24.Med, making diapers
25.Med, Khalida making diapers
26.Med, Khalida making diapers
27.SOUNDBITE(Arabic) Khalida Jamal Yassin:” And there is a difficulty with the [sewing] motor; the motor sometimes works, sometimes not; it may malfunction so we would have to stop. Because there is no supply of gas or solar for the motor. So now, the thing we suffer the most is powering the motor, and the shortage of elastic bands; elastic bands are not available at all anywhere. So we demand that someone provides us with gas, for power, so that we can produce large quantities for people.”
28.Wide, motor
29.Wide, people transporting materials
30.Wide, boxes on a donkey cart
31.Med, a man carrying boxes
32.SOUNDBITE(Arabic) Khalida Jamal Yassin: “We have no belongings, no tools, no children's clothes, we suffer a lot, sitting in a landfill area. I mean, our whole life has become just a place to stay; we're tired of something called war. So we suffered a lot, I swear.”
Around 1.5 million people – including tens of thousands of pregnant women, new mothers and newborns – are crammed into Rafah, with insufficient food to eat, hardly any access to medical care, nowhere to sleep, and nowhere safe to go.
Around 180 women give birth every day in Gaza amid the destruction, facing unimaginable challenges to access adequate medical care. The number of difficult births has soared compared to the time before the war. Mothers and babies are sick, malnourished, scared, and exhausted – and nursing staff often lack supplies. Doctors say they no longer see healthy sized babies and are witnessing babies dying simply because their birth weight is just too low.
If women and their newborns do survive pregnancy and childbirth, they must return to squalid conditions in displacement sites, accompanied by hunger and the diseases that stalk it, amid life-threatening shortages of food, water and medical care. Mothers, tired and malnourished, are struggling to provide milk for their newborns. If formula is available in the camps of the displaced and is affordable, finding the clean water to boil and mix with it is a struggle.
Securing nappies – a necessity many mothers take for granted – has also become a challenge, as prices skyrocket for items made scarce by close to six months of war. Mothers are forced to look for alternatives. In flimsy tents in camps for displaced people in Rafah, there is also nowhere to wash or to bathe newborns.
Despite ongoing attacks and multiple obstructions to safe aid delivery, UNFPA and partners have delivered around 15,400 hygiene and dignity kits to women and girls in Rafah, Khan Younis and the Middle Area of Gaza - and the West Bank displacement sites. The kits contain basic hygiene items – soap, sanitary pads, hand sanitizer, baby wipes, shampoo, underwear, and toilet paper. But it is not enough. The only way for the people of Gaza to come back from the brink of death is for the fighting to stop, for the rules of war to be respected by all parties and at all times, and for humanitarians to have safe, sustained and unconditional access to the people in need.
UNFPA welcomes the Security Council resolution on Gaza, demanding an immediate ceasefire, and the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages, and urges its immediate implementation.
