Tue Aug 05 11:13:32 UTC 2025: **FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE**
**Gaza Graveyard: Over 18,000 Children Killed in Israeli War, UN Reports**
**Gaza City –** A grim report from the United Nations reveals that over 18,000 children have been killed in Gaza since the start of the Israeli offensive, highlighting the devastating impact of the conflict on the youngest and most vulnerable. According to UNICEF, an average of 28 children, roughly the size of a classroom, are dying daily due to bombardments, starvation, and lack of access to vital aid.
“Death by bombardments. Death by malnutrition and starvation. Death by lack of aid and vital services,” UNICEF stated in a post on X. The agency emphasized the urgent need for food, clean water, medicine, and protection for children in Gaza, demanding an immediate ceasefire.
The war, which began on October 7, 2023, following an attack by Hamas on southern Israel, has resulted in at least 60,933 Palestinian deaths and 150,027 injuries. In the last 24 hours alone, at least eight Palestinians, including one child, have starved to death in Gaza. Since the start of the conflict, 188 people, including 94 children, have perished from starvation.
Al Jazeera reports that children are forced to replace their childhood, by working instead to support their families.
Testimonies from children in Gaza paint a heartbreaking picture of lives irrevocably altered. Displaced Palestinian child Kadim Khufu Basim, forced to support his family, said, “I love playing football. But now I sell cookies. My childhood is gone. Since the war began, we have no childhood left.”
Experts highlight that schools are deliberately targeted, water facilities destroyed, food supplies systematically blocked which is effectively weaponizing fundamental rights of childhood against an entire generation. The war’s psychological toll is also immense. Lana, a 10-year-old displaced child, developed trauma-induced depigmentation after a bombing near her shelter, leading to social isolation and severe mental health issues.
“Gaza is a graveyard for children today and for their dreams,” said Ahmad Alhendawi, regional director of Save the Children. “This is an inescapable living nightmare for every child in Gaza … This is a generation that is growing up thinking that the world has abandoned them, that the world has turned its back on them.”
Israel has severely restricted aid access to Gaza, with only 86 trucks entering daily, a mere 14% of the minimum 600 trucks needed to meet basic needs. This has triggered an unprecedented famine.
UN experts and over 150 humanitarian organizations are urgently calling for a permanent ceasefire to allow for aid deliveries and the psychological recovery of what they describe as a “lost generation.”
First Piper 