Gaza, Palestinian Territories -- The Israeli forces have killed at least 45,553 Palestinian civilians and injured at least 108,379 others, most of them children, since the beginning of their onslaught on the occupied territory in Oct 2023. The Palestinian Ministry of Health said today that the Israeli forces committed two...

A strong athlete, she played football with the boys in her village of Biban Mesbah, but beating them in matches brought on brawls where she fought back with punches. These fights ultimately led her to boxing, and on Friday one of the most contentious gold medals in recent memory.

Palestinian Territories - The children of Gaza have little to eat, have had to flee their homes and have survived nearly six months of terrifying Israeli bombardment. But for a few precious minutes children in the Nuseirat refugee camp in the center of the Gaza Strip laughed and yelped with...

The war between army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and his former deputy, Mohamed Hamdan Daglo, has since April last year killed tens of thousands, destroyed infrastructure and crippled the economy. It has also triggered a dire humanitarian crisis and acute food shortages, with the country teetering on the brink of...

Geneva, Switzerland – The number of children who died before their fifth birthday has reached a historic low, dropping to 4.9 million in 2022, according to the latest estimates released today by the United Nations Inter-agency Group for Child Mortality Estimation (UN IGME). “Behind these numbers lie the stories of...

Palestinian Territories - At the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza, Abu Gibril was so desperate for food to feed his family that he slaughtered two of his horses. "We had no other choice but to slaughter the horses to feed the children. Hunger is killing us," he told AFP....

Twenty weeks into Israel's war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip, UN agencies warned that food and safe water had become "incredibly scarce" in the Palestinian territory, adding that virtually all young children had infectious illnesses. UN assessment indicated that more than 15 percent of children under the age of...

Witnesses heard an intense series of strikes and saw smoke billowing above the city, which now hosts more than half of Gaza's total population after they fled bombardment elsewhere on the Strip. The strikes hit 14 houses and three mosques in different parts of Rafah, according to the Hamas government.

Palestinian Territories - Six-year-old Hind Rajab pleaded to be rescued, after her family's car came under fire in war-ravaged Gaza City, leaving her alone, frightened and injured, surrounded by the bodies of her dead relatives. "I am so scared," she had said in a desperate phone call to the Palestine...

Hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians have fled south to Rafah since the outbreak of the war, with the former city of 200,000 now housing more than half of Gaza's two million-plus population, a WHO representative said Friday. The United Nations' humanitarian agency OCHA said it was deeply concerned about...

"Each one has a heartbreaking story of loss and grief," said Jonathan Crickx, spokesman for the UN children's agency UNICEF in the Palestinian territories. "This figure corresponds to one percent of the overall displaced population -- 1.7 million people," he told a media briefing.

Several countries, including the United States, Britain, Germany and Japan, have suspended funding to the UNRWA agency, and the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres was holding crunch talks with donor countries. Agency chiefs in the UN's highest-level humanitarian coordination forum warned defunding UNRWA risked a "catastrophic" humanitarian collapse in Gaza.

Three UN agencies -- the World Food Program (WFP), UNICEF and the World Health Organization (WHO) -- pushed for the opening of Ashdod in a joint statement on Monday. The use of Ashdod, located some 25 miles (40 kilometers) north of the Gaza border, is "critically needed by aid agencies,"...

Bringing food and supplies to the besieged population of Gaza, which is increasingly at risk of famine, also depends on the opening of new entry routes into the territory, the World Food Program (WFP), UNICEF and the World Health Organization (WHO) said in a joint statement.

Andrea De Domenico, head of the UN aid agency OCHA's office in the occupied Palestinian territories, described how detailed coordination was required with a network of checkpoints, and "the Israelis have systematically, or quasi-systematically, refused" to let them through. In recent days, he said the agency had had three missions...

The region, with the world's highest youth unemployment rate, requires the creation of 33.3 million jobs by 2030 to accommodate the large number of candidates each year.

The situation in Gaza is a humanitarian catastrophe, with hospitals like Al-Shifa and Al-Sahaba facing dire shortages of medical supplies and staff, and the population grappling with acute hunger and the threat of famine, adds the World Health Organization Director-General.

The United Nation says children make up half of the 1.9 million displaced Palestinians and a sizable number have been killed in Israeli strikes.

Geneva, Switzerland - Gaza is "the most dangerous place in the world" for a child, the UN children's agency spokesperson said Tuesday, expressing his rage at the situation there after returning from the Palestinian territory. "I'm furious that those with power shrug at the humanitarian nightmares unleashed on a million children,"...

The announcement came more than two months into the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza as international aid organizations have warned about the dire conditions in the crowded Palestinian territory. The ministry did not specify which vaccinations had run out, and its claim could not be independently verified.

Beirut, Lebanon - Lebanon's compounding crises are having a "devastating" impact on children and their education, a United Nations agency said Wednesday, warning of additional pressure as the Israel-Hamas war spills over into the country. UN children's agency UNICEF said more than a quarter of households surveyed last month reported children...

The agency said the funding would allow it to reach 17.3m children in need of measles vaccinations, 7.6m children with acute malnutrition, and 19.3m children lacking access to education. At the same time, the United Nations Population Fund called for $1.2bn in funding "to address the mounting crises affecting women...

“Our appeal is that children and youth are integral to any discussion, debate, negotiation in a meaningful, participatory, and intentional way. Here in Dubai for COP, we’ve seen massive youth and children delegations,” adds Carla Haddad Mardini, Director of Private Fundraising and Partnerships at UNICEF.

Sixty-nine million children live in poverty in the world's 40 richest countries, UNICEF said in a report, blasting Britain and France for their particularly bad standings. That's despite a drop in child poverty rates by around 8 percent in the 40 European Union and Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development...

"The so-called safe zones... are not scientific, they are not rational, they are not possible, and I think the authorities are aware of this," James Elder, spokesman for the UN children's agency UNICEF, told reporters in Geneva.

Richard Peeperkorn, the WHO's representative in the occupied Palestinian territories, said that since the start of the war, there had been 120,000 acute respiratory infections; close to 26,000 people with scabies and lice; 86,000 cases of diarrhea, including 44,000 among children aged under five, which he said was 20 to...

Some countries face more intense competition for water resources, leading to potentially severe environmental impacts. The contrast underscores the diverse challenges they face in water resource management.

UNICEF's executive director Catherine Russell, on a rare visit to the Palestinian territory by a top UN official, said she witnessed devastating scenes and urged Israel and Hamas to "stop this horror".

The heads of 18 organizations including UNICEF, the World Food Program and the World Health Organization described the horrific toll on both sides since the October 7 Hamas cross-border attack from Gaza into Israel, which left about 1,400 people dead, mainly civilians, according to Israeli authorities. Israel has retaliated with...

Rabat, Morocco - On average, around 420 children are killed or injured every day in Israel’s attacks on the Gaza Strip since October 7, UNICEF said on Tuesday. “Our gravest fears about the reported numbers of children killed becoming dozens, then hundreds, and ultimately thousands were realized in just a...

Rafah, Palestinian Territories -- Eight sleeping children killed in one strike, doctors fighting but failing to save an unborn child -- such were the stories recounted by Gaza medics on Thursday as Israel stepped up its air strikes. Gaza's Hamas-run government said that children made up 1,524 of the 3,785 people...

Amira, 44, and her children have moved to the courtyard of the Nasser hospital in the southern district of Khan Yunis. "Our bodies itch all over. It has been a week since we could take a shower," she told AFP as she prepared sandwiches for her children with some loaves...

Last month's flood was the latest catastrophe to strike the oil-rich North African country that has been wracked by war and lawlessness since a NATO-backed uprising in 2011 ousted and killed longtime dictator Moamer Kadhafi. The psychological impact of the disaster will also be felt for a long time among...

In a sweeping report on the issue, the United Nations agency detailed the heart-wrenching stories of some of the children affected, and co-author Laura Healy told AFP the data only revealed the "tip of the iceberg," with many more likely affected. According to the prediction of UNICEF report, Floods linked...

Lack of funding for the school system has precipitated repeated teachers' strikes and school closures, resulting in children being increasingly pulled out of the formal learning system, and in some cases being forced to work. Lebanon's public institutions have been crumbling since the economy collapsed in late 2019, pushing most...

Kyrgyzstan has already twice taken back its citizens from Syria or Iraq. In March 2021, 79 children were repatriated while in February this year another 59 women and children were returned. Thousands of people from the former Soviet republics of Central Asia -- Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan --...

NEW YORK, US - Two senior UN humanitarian officials have called for more funding and fewer bureaucratic impediments to support civilians affected by the crisis in Sudan, including roughly 14 million children. Ted Chaiban, Deputy Executive Director for Humanitarian Action and Supply Operations at the UN children’s agency (UNICEF), and...

After nearly six weeks of street battles between forces loyal to rival generals and with temperatures regularly topping 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit), many inhabitants of the capital's northern suburbs are in desperate need of drinking water.

However, fighting continues in the Sudanese capital, where the conflict has already claimed around 700 lives and displaced nearly 450,000 civilians, reports suggest.

A grim UNICEF report warns of a potential outbreaks of polio and measles in children who didn't get vaccinated because of the disruptions caused by the Covid pandemic. The report said that more than" a decade of hard-earned gains in routine childhood immunization have been eroded" and that getting back...

CAIRO/AMMAN, EGYPT/JORDAN -   Measles and polio vaccination campaign will be launched on Saturday across northwest Syria to protect some 800,000 children under five years from the two potentially deadly but preventable diseases, the World Health Organization (WHO) said in a statement. The vaccination drive, supported by WHO, the Vaccine Alliance...

Improved farming techniques, better desalination technologies, awareness campaigns and global cooperation can mitigate the regions problems caused by water scarcity.

Doha, Qatar-- Qatar is preparing to inaugurate the UN House in Doha, on the sidelines of the fifth UN Conference on Least Developed Countries (LDC5) which will be held in the capital from March 5-9. Sheikha Alya Ahmed bin Saif Al-Thani, Permanent Representative of Qatar to the United Nations Ambassador,...

Children in Iraq work as apprentice mechanics and rubbish collectors, in shisha cafes or hair salons, and washing car windows and selling paper tissues by the roadside. Employing children is punishable by prison time or a fine, but "with many families left without a breadwinner, mothers have been forced to...

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia--The Arab Gulf Program for Development (AGFUND) will support UNICEF with funding in order to contain the spread of waterborne diseases in Lebanon. In this regard an agreement was signed in Riyadh by Prince Abdulaziz bin Talal bin Abdulaziz, Chairman of the Board of Directors of AGFUND, and...

Last week's quake has affected more than seven million children, including 2.5 million in Syria alone, according to James Elder of UNICEF.

"In Turkey, the total number of children living in the 10 provinces hit by the two earthquakes was 4.6 million children. In Syria, 2.5 million children are affected," James Elder, spokesman for the UN children's agency Unicef, told reporters in Geneva.

United Nations, United States--An estimated five million children under the age of five died in 2021, the United Nations said Tuesday, urging health care investment in underserved communities around the globe to avoid this "immense, intolerable and mostly preventable loss of life." "Every day, far too many parents are facing the trauma...

Hundreds of thousands have died since, either as a result of fighting or indirectly through unsafe drinking water, disease outbreaks, hunger and other impacts. The agency's latest numbers confirm 3,774 child deaths between March 2015 and September 2022. A UN-brokered truce lasted for six months until October 2, but warring parties...

Paris, France— Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the resulting economic fallout have thrown four million children into poverty across eastern Europe and Central Asia, the UN children's agency said Monday. "Children are bearing the heaviest burden of the economic crisis caused by the war in Ukraine," UNICEF said. The conflict "and...