Palestine Red Crescent Society Response Report As of Saturday, October 7th 2023, 6:00 PM Until Tuesday, January 13, 2024 24:00 AM [EN/AR]

Palestine Red Crescent Society teams are still responding to the developments on the ground in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, where PRCS operations are carried out 24\7, for the 99 day in a row.

Recent Developments

Communication has been completely cut off with our teams operating in the Gaza Strip for the second day due to the Israeli occupation cutting communication and internet services. This disruption increases the challenges facing the PRCS's emergency services in reaching the wounded and injured promptly

Gaza Strip:

Disclaimer: The following information in this report is the maximum which our teams were able to collect from direct follow-ups and various sources due to the complete loss of telecommunications and the great difficulty in reaching the sources of information as of Jan 12th 2024 at 13:00.

• Bereaved PRCS teams today participated in the burial services of the four martyrs who have fallen yesterday during humanitarian service rendered in PRCS’ Central Governorate Center.

• The Israeli Occupation Forces massacres against Palestinians are on the rise, during the past 24 hours alone the Israeli Occupation Forces committed 10 new massacres against Palestinians and Since the onset of the current hostilities, the Israeli Occupation forces have committed 1,966 massacres against Palestinian families. These horrific events have led to the martyrdom of thousands and wounded tens of thousands more, in addition to familicide; effectively annihilating hundreds of families fully wiping them out from the civil registry.

• PRCS OPS, EMS, rescue and relief, and Paramedics teams are all experiencing sporadic internet outages at our headquarters and Al-Amal Hospital in Khan Yunis. These disruptions are a direct consequence of the recent assaults by the Israeli occupation forces on the areas in the vicinity of the hospital.

• 2 PRCS EMS centers in Gaza and Northern Gaza have been put out of service ceasing to provide any services including emergency response and rescue upon running out of fuel along with the Israeli occupying forces restrictions of access of the working medical teams. Moreover, Hospitals in the governorate are put of service as well and it is impossible to conduct any humanitarian evacuation.

• Well over 900,000 children in the shelters are at risk of dehydration, starvation, digestive and respiratory diseases, skin diseases, and anemia.

• Well over 50,000 pregnant women in the shelters are without water, food, and healthcare, with about 180 women giving birth daily in unsafe and inhumane conditions.

• The healthcare system in the southern areas of Gaza is continuously deteriorating, while the northern areas of Gaza are completely deprived of any healthcare services, especially after the Israeli Occupation forces forced the Red Crescent Society EMS teams to evacuate out of the Northern Governorate thus obliging them to cease their medical operations there.

• According to live testimonies of Palestinian survivors from the northern governorates of Gaza who reported that the Israeli occupation forces committed mass executions and burials of Palestinian civilians in the Gaza and Northern governorates. Civilians were placed in ditches, executed, and mass buried in the same ditches.

• Hundreds of pleas continue to come through various communication means of Palestine Red Crescent Society from citizens to intervene and evacuate them from different areas in the Gaza Strip where the army of the Israeli occupation is present and deemed Israeli military operation zones. The occupation forces deliberately prevent our teams from intervening in those areas and our teams are subjected to targeted killing.

• All hospitals in Gaza and North Gaza provinces ceased operations due to the Israeli Occupation forces directly targeting and besieging the facilities. This includes preventing access for injured individuals and forcing medical teams to relocate southwards. Hospitals, medical staff, and displaced people within are directly targeted by the Israeli Occupation forces, leading to a severe health crisis.

• Hospitals in South Gaza are utilized beyond their capacity and unable to keep up with the massive number of injured persons, many of whom are at risk of losing their lives due to the escalation of Israeli aggression against civilians.

• Al-Amal Hospital in Khan Younis continues to face a severe fuel crisis, leading to downsizing utilization of the capacity of the facility to a bare minimum and operating according to a scheduled timetable. This significantly affects services for displaced people and patients, including ambulance and emergency medical services.

• Israeli Occupation forces continue intense airstrikes throughout Gaza, targeting industrial, residential, and commercial structures, as well as religious sites and main roads. This has resulted in numerous casualties, predominantly children and women, and complete infrastructure destruction, forcing citizen displacement.

• Israeli Occupation forces continue their incursions in strategic areas of Gaza and North Gaza, isolating them from southern provinces, and targeting any movement in these isolated areas. They have partially separated the regions by closing Salah al-Din Street, while allowing only a civilian passage through a mandatory route on Al-Rasheed Street.

• Medical and relief teams services are severely challenged due to the current status quo, the separation of Gaza and North Gaza, whereas Israeli occupation forces prohibit access to ambulances and EMS teams in areas of the Israeli military incursion and further shoots any moving target.

• The Israeli occupation forces continue to detain 7 members of the PRCS teams in the Northern Governorate of Gaza (paramedics and volunteers). This detention marks the 23 th consecutive day. Noting the detainees were apprehended at the PRCS's headquarters and taken to an undisclosed location, with their fate, current status, and whereabouts still unknown at this moment.

• The Israeli occupation forces continue the arbitrary detention of Awni Khattab, Director of the Khan Younis EMS, a PRCS facility, for the 51 h day in a row. It is noteworthy to mention that he was illegally apprehended at the checkpoint separating Northern and Southern Gaza while transferring a critical medical convoy of injured civilians from Al Shifa hospital to then operating Hospitals in the southern of Gaza.