UN / GRIFFITHS GAZA HUMANITARIAN SITUATION
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STORY: UN / GRIFFITHS GAZA HUMANITARIAN SITUATION
TRT: 03:25
SOURCE: UNIFEED
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS
DATELINE: 03 NOVEMBER 2023, NEW YORK CITY / FILE
FILE - NEW YORK CITY
1. Wide shot, exterior UN Headquarters
03 NOVEMBER 2023, NEW YORK CITY
2. Wide shot, conference room
3. SOUNDBITE (English) Martin Griffiths, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“What we've seen unfold over the last 26 days in Israel and in the occupied territories is nothing short of what I think I would call a blight on our collective conscience, all of us. We are all somehow involved in this.”
4. Wide shot, conference room
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Martin Griffiths, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“This is a humanitarian issue of the highest importance, finding these people and getting them home. In 26 days also, close to 9,000 Palestinians have been killed in the hostilities in Gaza, and God knows how many more there are uncounted under the rubble. Because we all know from other places that the numbers, the real numbers of those dead, only emerge much later when the buildings are cleared, the rubble is taken away and the bodies of those who perished become revealed.”
6. Wide shot, conference room
3. SOUNDBITE (English) Martin Griffiths, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“UNRWA, the bulwark, the safety net, the buffer of so many people of Gaza for so many years, is practically out of business. I pay tribute here as I was going to do later - I don't even know the numbers today this morning. Yesterday it was 72 killed UNRWA staff, this brave staff. I know we had 14,000 national staff in Gaza at the outset. Many of them fled. But I think 5,000 or so are still working. And I don't know how many are dead now.”
7. Wide shot, conference room
8. SOUNDBITE (English) Martin Griffiths, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“So, we're not keeping up, despite the fact that these negotiations continue all hours of the day and night. And it's just to the credit of those around that table that they do that. And they do look at issues like fuel, like water, like trucking, like access, like human rights, like international humanitarian law. They can't keep up with the needs.”
9. Wide shot, conference room
10. SOUNDBITE (English) Martin Griffiths, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA):
“These negotiations must continue but they are not enough. We must have those pauses. We must have those pauses. If we do not have pauses, we will not keep up with the needs of the people of Gaza and the Israelis also caught up in those areas of conflict.”
11. Wide shot, conference room
Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Martin Griffiths today (3 Nov) said, “what we've seen unfold over the last 26 days in Israel and in the occupied territories is nothing short of what I think I would call a blight on our collective conscience.”
Addressing a briefing on the humanitarian situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory organized by United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), Griffiths said, finding and releasing the over 200 hostages taken by the group Hamas is “a humanitarian issue of the highest importance.”
He also noted that in those 26 days also, “close to 9,000 Palestinians have been killed in the hostilities in Gaza, and God knows how many more there are uncounted under the rubble.”
The humanitarian official said, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), “the bulwark, the safety net, the buffer of so many people of Gaza for so many years, is practically out of business.”
He paid tribute to the UNRWA staff killed, saying, “I don't even know the numbers today this morning. Yesterday it was 72 killed UNRWA staff, this brave staff. I know we had 14,000 national staff in Gaza at the outset. Many of them fled. But I think 5,000 or so are still working. And I don't know how many are dead now.”
Griffiths, who is also the United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator said, “we're not keeping up, despite the fact that these negotiations continue all hours of the day and night. And it's just to the credit of those around that table that they do that. And they do look at issues like fuel, like water, like trucking, like access, like human rights, like international humanitarian law. They can't keep up with the needs.”
He said, “these negotiations must continue but they are not enough. We must have those pauses. We must have those pauses. If we do not have pauses, we will not keep up with the needs of the people of Gaza and the Israelis also caught up in those areas of conflict.”
Negotiations involving Israel, Egypt, the United States, and the UN continue, with more than 300 trucks having moved into Gaza as of yesterday. More than 100 trucks moved into Gaza yesterday alone, yet that remains far less than the 500 truckloads of goods that moved into Gaza every day prior to the current crisis.