UN Reports Violations Against Children in Gaza Conflict Have Reached ‘Extreme Levels’

 In 2023, violence directed at children caught up in escalating conflicts in various regions was reported to be of extreme severity, with the highest incidence of fatalities and injuries, including in the occupied Palestinian territories, according to a UN report. 

 The report written by Secretary-General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres’ noted that children continue to be killed and mutilated in the most dire ways, especially in the Gaza Strip, in the middle of severe crises. The annual Children and Armed Conflict report revealed a horrifying twenty-one percent rise in grave violations committed against children in or around their 18th birthday across different conflict-stricken countries such as DR Congo, Burkina Faso, Somalia, and Syria. 

 In all, 30 705 violations involving children in 2023 were documented by the UN, of which 15 800 were boys and 6 250 girls, and some multiple violations. Fighter forces committed nearly half of the severe abuses, while government forces were the main offenders in killings, mutilations, assaults on schools and hospitals, and expulsion of aid agencies. 

 For the first time, the UN report accused the Israeli forces of violating children’s rights, detailing 5,698 grave violations by the Israeli forces and armed groups, including killing, maiming, and attacks on schools and hospitals in the course of distanced and occupied Palestinian territories. 

Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad were also listed for the first time. It recorded 116 attacks by Hamas, 58 unknown attackers, 51 settlers, 21 Islamic Jihad, 13 Palestinians, and one by Palestinian Authority security forces, and 2,051 more attacks that were pending on the verifications. 

 It singled out the situation following the Hamas’ attacks on southern Israel on October 7 and the alleged Israeli onslaught on Gaza, which witnessed a steep rise in the abuse of children primarily through detonation of explosive weapons in built-up areas. Cited by the UN, 2,141 Palestinian children died in Gaza, with another 9,100 claimed to be probably confirmed but unconfirmed. 

According to the UN report, 19,887 Palestinian children have been killed or injured in the Palestinian territories, and the verification continues. 

 Guterres pointed to the record level and rate of abuses of children in the Gaza Strip, Israel, and the occupied western bank of the Jordan River, including eastern Jerusalem. He repeated the appeal to refer to the adherence to international law concerning the non-targeting of civilians and the avoidance of the use of disproportionate force on the part of Israel. 

 Besides Palestinian territories, other theatres of conflict have also shown a rise in violations, according to the report. In Sudan, for instance, there has been an armed conflict between rival generals aided by a successful political coup d’état since April 2023; there was a monstrous attempt to increase grave violations by 480 percent on children. 

The operations of both the Sudanese military and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces were sanctioned for acts of killing, maiming, and bombing schools and hospitals, recruitment, and use of children in military actions, and perpetrating rape and other forms of sexual violence. 

 Myanmar witnessed a 123 percent rise in civil conflict where multiple violations against children took place; in this regard, the Myanmar armed forces, related militias, and seven associated armed groups are named on the list. The report confirmed 2,799 grave violations against 2,093 children, with 238 killed and 623 injured by the military and its allied militia groups. 

 The UN left the Russian armed forces and related groups on the blocklist for the second consecutive year for killing and injuring children in Ukraine and attacking schools and hospitals, confirming the deaths of 80 Ukrainian children and the wounding of 419 by Russian forces and Their affiliates have used predominantly explosive weapons. 

 The special representative of the secretary-general for children, Virginia Gamba, said that worrying developments are using schools and hospitals as a strategy for battles. She appealed to all to cease this practice and let Hospitals maintain their protected status, observing that there has been an escalation of verified reports that Hospitals are denying humanitarian access to children to the tune of 5,205; this is a 32% increase.