By Nidal Al-Mughrabi and Hussam Al-Masri
CAIRO/GAZA (Reuters) – The United Nations, working with Palestinian health authorities, began vaccinating 640,000 children in the Gaza Strip on Sunday after Israel and Hamas agreed to suspend their 11-month war to allow the vaccination campaign to go ahead.
The World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed last month that an infant had been partially paralyzed by type 2 poliovirus, the first case in the region in 25 years.
The operation began in central Gaza on Sunday and is due to spread to other areas in the coming days, with fighting halting for at least eight hours for three consecutive days.
The WHO said the pause period would likely need to be extended to a fourth day, meaning the first vaccine doses would be administered just under two weeks later.
Children accompanied by their families gathered at a UN-run clinic in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip, where some 1 million people have sought refuge, Palestinian officials said, as medical staff marked the children’s fingers with a pen as they received intravenous drips.
“Today I came to the UNRWA clinic to vaccinate my daughters against polio. With God’s help, I hope we will be able to return home safely,” said Afnan Al-Mukayyad, a mother from Gaza.
Polio was just one of Al Muqayyad’s many concerns.
“Skin diseases are rampant and there is no detergent. Detergent is very expensive and we cannot afford it. Also food is very expensive, everything is expensive and children are losing weight. They were fine before but now they are very thin. I hope God will make things right,” she said.
A “complicated” campaign
Juliette Touma, director of communications for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), said the vaccination campaign was massive and “one of the most complex in the world”.
“Today is a test for the parties to the conflict to respect the pause in the area to allow UNRWA teams and other medical workers to reach these two very precious drops of medicine to children. It’s a race against time,” Touma told Reuters.
Israel and Hamas, who have so far been unable to reach an agreement to end the war, said they would cooperate to make the operation a success.
WHO officials say for the campaign to be successful, at least 90 percent of children need to be vaccinated with two doses, spaced four weeks apart, but they face a huge challenge in Gaza, a region largely devastated by war.
“Children remain at risk of infection. This disease knows no borders, checkpoints or battle lines. Every child in Gaza and Israel must be vaccinated to reduce the risk of the spread of this terrible disease,” Touma said.
Meanwhile, Israeli forces continue to battle Hamas-led militants in several parts of the Palestinian territories, with Israeli forces bombing several homes in Rafah, near the Egyptian border, and tank operations continuing in the northern Gaza city suburb of Zaytun, residents said.
Israel on Sunday recovered the bodies of six hostages in a tunnel in southern Gaza, apparently killed shortly before Israeli forces arrived, the army said.
The war began on October 7 when Hamas fighters invaded southern Israel, leaving an Israeli tally of 1,200 people dead and more than 250 taken hostage.
Since then, at least 40,691 Palestinians have been killed and 94,060 injured in the Gaza Strip, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.
(Reporting and writing by Nidal Al-Mughrabi; Additional reporting by Husam Al-Masri and Ramadan Abed in Gaza; Editing by Sharon Singleton)
