Israel critically undermining Gaza polio vaccination: Rights group

A Geneva-based human rights group says Israel keeps undermining a polio vaccination campaign in the Gaza Strip, targeting areas designated as safe for providing vaccination to Palestinian children in northern areas of the territory.  

Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor posted a thread on social media platform X on Tuesday, saying Israeli forces “bombed a food stall in the Tuffah neighborhood located between 3 deconflicted centers.”

The area, it said was “designated as safe for providing Polio vaccination to children in Northern Gaza.”

The Euro-Med said that “the targeted food stall in the Tuffah neighborhood east of Gaza City is only tens or hundreds of meters away from the designated safe vaccination centers” in the territory.

“We have also documented airstrikes in Southern Gaza that similarly undermine the crucial polio vaccination campaign.”

The rights group also said the regime’s military forces stopped and interrogated a UN mission in the Gaza Strip on Monday, in a move that “indicate a clear tendency” for Israel to “obstruct humanitarian and relief efforts.”

After covering central and southern Gaza, the giant polio vaccination campaign moved into its final phase in the north from Tuesday until Thursday, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

Gaza polio vaccination one of the most dangerous campaigns on Earth: UNICEF

Even with a polio pause, the vaccination campaign faces grave danger and immeasurable obstacles in Gaza.

WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said over 446,000 children were given polio vaccines in south Gaza. The preparation for the start of the vaccination campaign in the area is ongoing, he said.

“Vaccines, finger markers and cold chain equipment were delivered to the north yesterday. Our team is trying to deliver more fuel to ensure vehicles used by vaccination to reach the children remain functional, and hospitals can be resupplied to maintain essential services.”

The WHO chief also said that children in Gaza “deserve lasting peace, not just polio vaccines.”

He called for maintaining humanitarian pauses and respecting the safety of health workers.

The Gaza Strip has been polio-free for the last 25 years. Health experts say Israel’s destruction of the territory’s health and sanitation infrastructure has been behind the outbreak of the deadly disease.