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STORY: GAZA / UN SCHOOL ATTACK
TRT: 3.09
SOURCE: UNRWA
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH /NATS
DATELINE: 30 JULY 2014, GAZA STRIP, PALESTINE
1. Med shot, gate of the school, damaged walls
2. Med shot, journalists, locals and internally displaced persons by wing of school that was hit
3. Med shot, wing of school that was hit
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Pierre Krahenbuhl UNRWA Commissioner-General:
“We had repeatedly informed the Israeli Defense Forces about this particular school. We had notified it because it was important to protect it. And also because the people who were in this school where there because they had received instructions from the Israeli Defense Forces to leave the areas where they lived in and therefore they were sheltered in that premise, hoping and expecting there to be safe and protected. And the fact that they weren’t is unacceptable. And in the strongest possible terms I issue today a condemnation of the Israeli shelling of the school as representing a serious violation of international law.”
5. Pan right, over classroom that was destroyed by shell
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Pierre Krahenbuhl UNRWA Commissioner-General:
“We are here in a situation where UNRWA finds itself dealing now with 220.000 people in 82 of its school throughout the Gaza Strip. And I think the world just has to understand that when we here 220.000 people in 82 schools, maybe that sounds like something orderly, maybe that sounds like something sustainable, well it isn’t, and it’s very important to understand that. 200.000…220.000 people having moved, that is the large part of my own hometown of Geneva in Switzerland as having been displaced.”
7. Med shot, through hole in school wal created by shell. UNRWA ambulance in outside. UNRWA staff by ambulance
8. SOUNDBITE (English) Pierre Krahenbuhl UNRWA Commissioner-General:
“UNRWA has provided heroically and courageously through its staff the food, mattresses, blankets and the basic needs but many other problems remain. There isn’t enough water, there aren’t showers, we are facing the risk of disease. And if there are more displacements, as is very well possible with the conflict dynamic going on we’ll have reached a point where it has to be said clearly that the Israeli security forces will have to take over responsibility directly to assist people because because it will be beyond what can be handled otherwise.”
9. Wide shot, internally displaced people packed by wall of school building
10. Close up, man and boy lying on ground by wall of school building
11. SOUNDBITE (English) Pierre Krahenbuhl UNRWA Commissioner-General:
“Right now there is no place in Gaza where civilians feel safe. Not even in what should be the sanctity of UN school buildings. And in that sense the world has failed these people and it has to be expressed in the strongest possible terms.”
12. Wide shot, people walking outside damaged parts of UNRWA Jabaliya school
13. Wide shot, people and cattle outside UNRWA Jabaliya school. Wrecked car in foreground
14. Pan right, wrecked car by damaged wall across the street from school to entrance of UNRWA Jabaliya school
In the early morning of 30 July, an UNRWA school in Jabaliya in the northern Gaza Strip that sheltered about 3,300 people was shelled, resulting in multiple deaths and injuries.
Initial investigations by United Nations relief and work agency (UNRWA) suggest that it was Israeli artillery that hit the school.
In his statement, UNRWA Commissioner General Pierre Krähenbühl condemned the attack “in the strongest possible terms.”
UNRWA's investigating teams have visited the site and gathered evidence. They have analysed fragments, examined craters and other damage.
UNRWA believes there were at least three impacts. The agency points out that the people who suffered the attack were instructed to leave their homes by the Israeli army.
The precise location of the Jabaliya Elementary Girls School and the fact that it was housing thousands of internally displaced people had been communicated to the Israeli army seventeen times, to ensure its protection; the last being at ten to the night before the incident, just hours before the fatal shelling.
It is at least the sixth time an UNRWA emergency shelter was struck. There is widespread fear amongst the displaced and UNRWA staff about the deteriorating security environment.
Also in Jabalia on 29 July, a staff member was killed when driving in an UNRWA vehicle.
Earlier that day, two UNRWA staff members died when an explosive projectile struck a private home in Nuseirat. UNRWA has so far lost seven staff members since beginning of hostilities.
Amidst intensified fighting and in anticipation of a flood of new displacements, the Agency has reached a breaking point. UNRWA is now providing shelter to 204,166 in 85 shelters in all five areas of the Gaza Strip, and the displaced influx continues.
