Anjali Sharma
GG News Bureau
UNITED NATIONS, 19th July. UN Women Representative in the Occupied Palestinian Territory Maryse Guimond said on Thursday that wars are never gender neutral and Gaza is further evidence of this as one million women and girls bear “the worst brunt” of 9 months of conflict.
Maryse Guimond briefed reporters from Jerusalem via video telecast in New York said “They are losing their lives, they are sick, hungry, exhausted, holding families together despite their constant fear and loss.”
Ms. Guimond concluded a weeklong mission to Gaza a place she has visited over 50 times in her six years in the job, including after previous escalations.
She was not prepared for “the total destruction and inhumanity” that she saw.
“What I witnessed defied my worst fears for the women and girls I have been working with for so many years,” she said. “It was unbearable to witness the daily escalation of violence and destruction of a war on women, with no end in sight.”
She said she entered a world of devastation and total deprivation when the fence at the Kerem Shalom border crossing closed behind her.
“I cannot underline enough the impact that this war has had on women and girls. I barely recognized women who I knew before the war. The last nine months is embedded on their faces, on their bodies.”
Ms. Guimond stressed that Gaza is “a war on women” simply because of the numbers who have been killed and injured, and the overall level of devastation that women there are facing.
“We have never seen this before,” she said.
UN said that over 10,000 women have been killed since the hostilities began on 7 October 2023, after the brutal Hamas-led attacks against Israel in which some 1,200 nationals and foreigners were killed and another 250 taken hostage.
Ms. Guimond said that conditions in the enclave are dire.
She cited UN women data that half a million women “are severely hungry, eating the last and the least of their families, skipping meals and not eating healthy foods for months and months.”
People are “living in overcrowded spaces, where infectious diseases are much more rampant”. Because there is no water, women have been forced to shave their heads to avoid infections.
“I could not recognize the Gaza I knew,” Ms. Guimond said.
“Homes, hospitals, shops, schools, universities have been destroyed. Crowds of men, women, children trying to survive in makeshift tents and overcrowded shelters surrounded by rubble and total destruction.”
She noted that most hospitals are no longer functioning, access to healthcare and medical treatment is limited.
Ms. Guimond replied that “some of pregnant women are so fearful of delivering in conditions that they have no control over that we’re hearing that some are actually asking if there’s a way for them to deliver more rapidly.”
UN Women have published several reports on the gender aspects of the Gaza conflict, highlighted how it is “fundamentally a protection crisis for women”.
Gaza has a population of 2 million, and 90 per cent have been displaced, including nearly a million women and girls who have been uprooted multiple times in an increasingly shrinking space.
“There are no safe places to be a woman in Gaza,” she said.
“They move with no cash, with no possessions, and with no clue how and where they’re going to live. Many women told me that they will not move again as it does not make a difference for their safety or survival.”
She added in the face of death, disease and displacement, women in Gaza “show remarkable strength and humanity in their struggling to survive, with hope and solidarity amidst the devastation,”.
UN Women Gender Alert, published the report last month examined how the war is impacting 25 women-led organizations in the occupied Palestinian territory, 18 of which are based in Gaza.
They have over 1,500 personnel who provide shelter site management, hygiene kits, food parcels, psychosocial support, and other essential services, despite a shortfall in funding.
These organizations need financial support to sustain their efforts, she said.
They also need to see an increase of women’s representation at the decision-making table in every step of the humanitarian assistance from planning to final delivery and they need them now.”
Ms. Guimond concluded the UN’s longstanding call for peace in Gaza, full access for humanitarian aid through the opening of all land crossings into the enclave, an immediate ceasefire and the release of all hostages.
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