Morocco–along with 34 member countries of the World Health Organization (WHO) Executive Board–Sunday in Geneva called for urgent and concrete de-escalation and for the guarantee of protection of civilians and medical facilities in Gaza.
In the Kingdom’s official statement during the session of the Executive Board of the WHO, Morocco’s permanent representative to Geneva, Omar Zniber, emphasized the need to ensure the unobstructed, sufficient delivery of humanitarian aid, medical supplies, and equipment for the benefit of Gaza’s inhabitants.
The official stated that the WHO must exercise a leadership role in the coming days and months to mitigate the devastating effects of the war in the Gaza Strip, including mobilization of the resources needed to finance immediate health needs, along with the reconstruction and renovation of the already-compromised medical facilities in the occupied Palestinian territory, particularly in Gaza.
Zniber went on to say that coordination with international humanitarian and development stakeholders is now more urgent than ever–with the objectives being to provide humanitarian assistance to the Palestinian people and to ensure the distribution of human and financial resources to rapidly achieve these objectives–which obviously requires collaboration with various UN agencies, such as UNRWA and other partners in the occupied Palestinian territory.
He added that the current session is taking place in a context of extreme socioeconomic and health precariousness in the occupied Palestinian territories, and that a total collapse of humanitarian conditions in the Gaza Strip–after two months of almost uninterrupted armed conflict in Gaza–has resulted in thousands of dead and wounded among an unarmed civilian population, and that the destruction of medical infrastructure and facilities has been a byproduct of the conflict.
During the session, The Executive Board of the WHO adopted by consensus a resolution calling for immediate humanitarian aid for Gaza.
The resolution, proposed by Morocco, Afghanistan, Qatar, and Yemen, calls for granting exit permits to patients, providing medicine and medical supplies for civilians, and ensuring that all detained individuals have access to medical care.
The resolution expresses “serious concern” about the humanitarian situation and “widespread destruction,” and calls for the protection of all civilians.
Some Western countries have expressed reservations.
The representative of the United States stated that Washington agreed not to oppose the consensus on the text but had “significant reservations,” stating that it “regretted the lack of balance in the resolution.”