UNICEF Acts Swiftly During Ceasefire to Address Huge Needs of Gaza's Children
UNICEF is on the ground in the Gaza Strip, working to meet the critical needs of children caught in a catastrophic situation. Learn more about UNICEF's impact, and how to help.
Right now, the lives of the most vulnerable children hang in the balance as conflicts and crises jeopardize the care and protection that they deserve. Dependable, uninterrupted and effective foreign aid is critical to the well-being of millions of children. Please contact your members of Congress and urge them to support ongoing U.S. investments in foreign assistance.
A devastating war and fragile ceasefire
After 15 months of a devastating war, the humanitarian situation remains catastrophic in the Gaza Strip. Most children have lost access to quality health care, education, water and other vital services.
Since the start of the war, UNICEF staff have remained on the ground, working with partners to provide safe drinking water to displaced families, treatment for severely malnourished children and medical supplies and vaccines for children in hospitals and shelters.
UNICEF's emergency response priorities
Under the ceasefire, UNICEF is expanding existing services, while establishing new ones to reach families on the move. Urgent priorities include:
IMMUNIZATION UNICEF remains the leading provider of all vaccines for children and women throughout the Gaza Strip, including for polio, diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, hepatitis B and more. A first priority is conducting immunization catch-up campaigns to prevent disease outbreaks.
NUTRITION As the lead agency in Gaza working to prevent and treat malnutrition in children, UNICEF is scaling up delivery of essential supplies including high-energy biscuits, ready-to-use therapeutic food and infant formula for the tens of thousands of children known to be suffering from malnutrition.
HEALTH With over 80 percent of health facilities in the Gaza Strip damaged or destroyed, UNICEF continues to help hospitals protect pregnant women and newborns from medical complications and infections, especially in neonatal units. UNICEF is delivering incubators for newborns, medical kits for midwives and other emergency supplies.
WATER AND SANITATION UNICEF continues to play a key role in sustaining and increasing water production in Gaza, helping to repair water facilities, distributing water treatment chemicals and delivering millions of gallons of fuel for wells, desalination plants and generators.
FAMILY REUNIFICATION UNICEF is the only agency facilitating family reunification for the estimated 17,000 children who became separated from their caregivers during the war. As families begin to move back to their homes, UNICEF is strengthening efforts to ensure children remain safely in the hands of their parents, while continuing to trace and reunite families that have been torn apart.
HUMANITARIAN CASH TRANSFERS UNICEF is providing more humanitarian cash transfers than any other organization in Gaza, supporting vulnerable groups – including female-headed households, pregnant and breastfeeding women and families of children with disabilities – with cash assistance that allows them to buy food, water and hygiene kits still available in markets.
MENTAL HEALTH SUPPORT UNICEF is providing basic mental health and psychosocial services in camps and shelters to give children a place to play, socialize with one another and feel a much-needed sense of normalcy. Play helps children cope with the trauma they've experience, and brings some relief to parents yearning to see their children just be kids again.
A look back at UNICEF's impact for children in the Gaza Strip in 2024
UNICEF has already reached millions in the Gaza Strip with lifesaving emergency assistance. According to UNICEF's year-end situation report, UNICEF's impact for children in Gaza over the past year includes:
- ensuring the provision of water for a monthly average of 1.8 million people, including over 700,000 children, across the Strip
- providing over 6 million liters of fuel to operate water facilities, treatment plants and sewage pumping stations
- reaching more than 1 million individuals, including 502,000 children, with humanitarian cash transfers
- delivering nutrition products for 1.4 million beneficiaries
- supplying 44 medical facilities with essential supplies and equipment, benefiting over 585,300 people
- administering novel oral polio vaccines to more than 1.1 million children in two rounds, achieving a 94 percent coverage rate in each
- distributing 400,000 child identification bracelets to families with young children to mitigate the risk of separation
- providing learning opportunities for more than 85,000 children in 75 temporary learning spaces, 35 community-led initiatives and 20 schools, along with education-based recreational activities for 53,000 children
Starting over, Gaza's families need urgent support
Throughout the Gaza Strip, families are returning to their homes, eager to resume their lives. Displaced by the war, Jehan and her husband and their children, including 9-year-old Aisha, are living in a tent on the site of their house in northern Gaza, which was destroyed by an airstrike.
“It is cold and there is no running water," said Jehan. "The conditions for life here are very bad, but we prefer it because it is our home, our land. I was devastated when I found out the house was destroyed. There were so many happy memories there. But I cried in secret because I had to stay strong for the children."
I was devastated when I found out the house was destroyed. There were so many happy memories there. But I cried in secret because I had to stay strong for the children.
"Inside I am breaking but outside, I am strong for them," Jehan continued. "They have had a very difficult time. Last night, with the storm, Aisha cried inside the tent. She was so scared of the noises and feeling so vulnerable. It almost felt like we were going to fly away so my husband went outside and held down the wooden posts with his arms for a long time until we fell asleep.”
A funding shortfall: children can't wait
There is much work to be done. Lack of access to safe water and sanitation, nutritious foods, medical care, immunizations and education endangers children's health and development. At least 14,500 children have reportedly been killed in the Gaza Strip since Oct. 7, 2023 — an average of 32 children killed every day. At least 23,000 children have been injured; thousands more are thought to remain buried under the rubble.
UNICEF continues to call for the immediate, safe and unconditional release of all abducted children, and an end to any grave violations against all children, including killing and maiming.
UNICEF's annual Humanitarian Action for Children appeal addressing the needs of children across the Gaza Strip and the West Bank showed a funding shortfall of $88.2 million (17 percent) at the end of 2024. In order to continue to provide lifesaving assistance to children and their families in 2025, UNICEF estimates that $716.5 million in funding will be needed.
HOW TO HELP
There are many ways to make a difference
War, famine, poverty, natural disasters — threats to the world's children keep coming. But UNICEF won't stop working to keep children healthy and safe.
UNICEF works in over 190 countries and territories — more places than any other children's organization. UNICEF has the world's largest humanitarian warehouse and, when disaster strikes, can get supplies almost anywhere within 72 hours. Constantly innovating, always advocating for a better world for children, UNICEF works to ensure that every child can grow up healthy, educated, protected and respected.
Would you like to help give all children the opportunity to reach their full potential? There are many ways to get involved.
