300 terribly sick Gaza children to be evacuated to UK for treatment
Up to 300 young people will enter the UK for free medical care, a scheme which will run in parallel with another similar operation run by the Project Pure Hope group, a senior Whitehall source told The Times.
Since the war began in October 2023, only three children from Gaza have been issued medical visas for the UK, under the Project Pure Hope scheme, which is funded entirely by private donations.
The news comes amid a starvation crisis in the ravaged Gaza Strip, where partial and complete Israeli blockades on aid have been behind more than 160 malnutrition-related deaths, including 92 children, health authorities in Gaza say.
Ted Chaiban, Unicef's deputy executive director for humanitarian action and supply operations, said on Friday that more than 320,000 young children are at risk of acute malnutrition, after a recent trip to Israel, Gaza and the occupied West Bank.
Demonstrators stage a protest in solidarity with the people of Gaza and Palestinian detainees, in Ramallah on Sunday. Agence France-Presse
The malnutrition indicator in Gaza has 'exceeded the famine threshold', Chaiban said in a statement.
'Horrifying images'
Last month, prime minister Sir Keir Starmer promised to evacuate badly injured children. He wrote in The Mirror: 'I know the British people are sickened by what is happening. The images of starvation and desperation in Gaza are utterly horrifying.
'We are urgently accelerating efforts to evacuate children from Gaza who need critical medical assistance – bringing more Palestinian children to the UK for specialist medical treatment.'
More than 100 MPs have signed a letter calling for the government to fast-track the scheme, The Times reports.
Labour backbench MP Stella Creasy said: 'The commitment we all share to help these children remains absolute and urgent – with every day, more are harmed or die, making the need to overcome any barriers to increasing the support we give them imperative.
'We stand ready to support whatever it takes to make this happen and ask for your urgent response.'
Israel denies there is widespread starvation and says that where there is significant hunger in the Strip, it is a result of the theft of aid by Hamas and of failure by the UN to successfully deliver aid.
But Unrwa, which was once the largest provider of humanitarian assistance for Palestinians in Gaza, says it has been entirely sidelined. Commissioner general Philippe Lazzarini said on Friday that the group has 6,000 trucks loaded with aid stuck waiting outside Gaza for Israel to give it the green light to enter.
Israel considers the disarmament of Hamas a key condition for any deal to end the conflict, but Hamas has repeatedly said it is not willing to lay down its weapons.
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