Gaza: Latest evacuation orders leave civilians dangerously close to frontline

This article is published in association with United Nations.

“Continuous” Israeli military evacuation orders in Gaza threaten already extremely vulnerable people in the enclave with further forced displacement, raising concerns that vital services could soon be cut off, UN humanitarians warned on Wednesday.

More than 10 months into the war in Gaza, sparked by Hamas-led terror attacks in Israel that left some 1,250 dead and more than 250 taken hostage, nearly all Gazans have been displaced at least once – and often multiple times – by repeated orders to evacuate and intense Israeli bombardment.

Kamal Al-Sultan, a displaced child from Beit Lahia in northern Gaza, has been forced to move seven times during the 10-month-long war.

“Nowhere in the Gaza Strip is safe…It does feel like people are waiting for death,” said Louise Wateridge, spokesperson for the UN agency for Palestine refugees, in an online message on X.

“Areas that were (in) the humanitarian zone are now the frontline,” she told UN News, noting also that Gazans “are never more than a few blocks away from the frontline now”.

Kamal Al-Sultan, a displaced child from Beit Lahia in northern Gaza, told UN News in Gaza that he has been displaced seven times since the war began, most recently from Deir Al-Balah Preparatory School for Boys, where he had sought shelter and safety.

“We were displaced from Beit Lahia to Deir Al-Balah, and now they are asking us to leave,” he told UN News. “We don’t know where to go.”

‘Like your soul leaving your body’

According to the UN agency for Palestine refugees, UNRWA, these new evacuation orders now cover approximately 84 per cent of the Gaza Strip. Meanwhile, many Gazans are being forced to move yet again.

“This displacement from Deir Al-Balah is our fourteenth,” said Yahya Halas, a displaced person from the Shujaiya neighbourhood east of Gaza City. “We were displaced from Shujaiya to the city of al-Zahraa to Rafah then to Khan Younis twice and to Deir Al-Balah three times. How long will this continue?”

He said being displaced is “not just about carry a bag”.

“Displacement is like the soul leaving the body,” Mr. Halas said. “We have children and women. We have belongings and food. Where will we go when all the displaced people go west? If you go to the west of Deir Al-Balah, you won’t be able to walk because there are so many people already there.”

Crucial axis road cut

In its latest update on the emergency, the UN aid coordination office, OCHA, insisted that the “relentless” hostilities and repeated evacuation orders in Gaza have continued to constrain relief operations “already hampered by access constraints, fuel shortages, and other challenges”.

OCHA reported that parts of Salah ad Din road – a crucial passage for humanitarian missions from south to north – were caught up in an evacuation order by the Israeli authorities issued on Saturday for Deir Al-Balah.

“This has made it nearly impossible for aid workers to move along this key route,” it noted. The Israeli Defense Forces issued a new order affecting neighbourhoods in the central city on Wednesday morning.

Gaza’s coastal road “is not a viable alternative” anymore, OCHA continued, explaining that the beaches along this route are “crowded with makeshift shelters” for Palestinians forcibly uprooted from their homes.

“As a result, convoy movements along the coastal road are extremely slow, and critical supplies and services – such as water trucking – are not reaching people in need at anywhere near the scale required,” the UN aid office warned.

Tanks in Khan Younis

In Khan Younis, where Israeli tanks have returned, UNRWA expressed growing concerns that key facilities in areas of the southern city slated for evacuation may soon be damaged or destroyed.

These include the just-restored water pumping station that serves some 100,000 people, the UNRWA Japanese Health Centre that re-opened last month and is slated to play a key role in the upcoming polio vaccination campaign and the Khan Younis Training Centre, a large facility now used as a warehouse to store humanitarian supplies.

“Without that warehouse, we cannot bring aid in and put it anywhere,” explained Ms. Wateridge. “There are no warehouses left.”

“You’ve got water, you’ve got medicine and vaccinations and you’ve got distribution; if any of these facilities gets damaged and destroyed, that is going to be disastrous,” she told UN News.

West Bank toll mounts

Meanwhile, UN aid coordination office OCHA reports that on average, at least one Palestinian has been killed every day so far this month by Israeli airstrikes in the occupied West Bank. Since October, airstrikes there have killed 128 Palestinians – including more than two dozen children.

As of Monday, OCHA says more than 600 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, since October – the vast majority by Israeli forces, and at least 11 by Israeli settlers. During the same period, 15 Israelis were killed by Palestinians in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.

OCHA has also recorded some 1,270 attacks by Israeli settlers against Palestinians over the past 10 months, causing deaths and injuries, as well as damage to property.