Source: United Nations (video statements)
Press conference by Mr. Tom Fletcher, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator will brief on Gaza.
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UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher welcomed the announcement of an agreement to secure a ceasefire and hostage release in Gaza, reiterating that the UN humanitarian family is “expert and determined,” with a detailed plan and tons of supplies in place.
Tom Fletcher spoke to reporters from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia via video link.
The Under-Secretary-General reiterated, “President Trump’s peace plan must be the basis for lifesaving work throughout the region. And for saving tens of thousands of lives.”
“We must seize this moment with collective will, with determination and with generosity. There must be no backsliding on the agreements that have been made,” Fletcher added.
The top UN humanitarian official laid out a plan for the first 60 days of the ceasefire. He said, “We will aim to increase the pipeline of supplies to hundreds of trucks every day. Food, we will scale up the provision of food across Gaza to reach 2.1 million people who need food aid, and around 500,000 people who need nutrition.”
“Famine must be reverted in areas where it has taken hold and prevented in others,” Fletcher stressed, adding that the UN will support bakeries, community kitchens.
“We’ll be supporting herders and fishers in restoring their livelihoods, and will be providing cash for 200,000 families to cover basic food needs and bolster their ability to cope,” the Under-Secretary-General said.
On health, Fletcher said the UN will restore the decimated health system.
He explained, “We will aim to deliver more essential medical commodities and medical supplies. We will aim to reestablish community level disease surveillance and to support emergency referrals and more medical evacuations, to supplement the workforce by deploying more emergency teams, and we will help scale up emergency care. Primary health, child health, sexual and reproductive, maternal and neonatal health, non-communicable diseases, mental health and rehabilitation.”
On water and sanitation, the humanitarian chief said, “We will help to restore the water grid, so to build up people’s reliance on water trucking, including by providing fuel, generators, chemicals, materials and supplies. We will install latrines at the household level. We will repair sewage leaks and pumping stations. We will move solid waste away from residential spaces and will provide hygiene supplies. Soap, shampoo, laundry detergent, sanitary pads.”
Moving onto education, Fletcher noted the UN will reopen temporary learning spaces to provide activities for 700,000 school aged children, and will provide them with learning materials and school supplies.
The top UN humanitarian official outlined ten key requirements to make the UN plan successful, including sustained fuel supply, multiple aid corridors, restored infrastructure, protection for humanitarian workers, and adequate funding.
He noted that at the moment, only 28 percent of the $4 billion needed for the 2025 flash appeal for these areas for the OPT has been funded, urging “every government, every State, every individual” to make “generosity count, to help us to deliver, to help us to save so many lives in the Gaza Strip, to respond to this plan at the scale required and with the level of kindness and generosity that, frankly, the world owes right now.”
Asked about working with the Israeli authority, Fletcher said, “We’ve worked with the Israeli authorities in the past, as we did during the 42 days of ceasefire back at the beginning of the year to delivery aid on a massive scale, 500, 600 trucks going in every day.”
“We have the muscle memory between us all,” the Under-Secretary-General said, “if we have the right spirit of dialog, cooperation and we can work to rebuild trust, then I’m confident that we can save lives at scale.”
“That lifesaving work, getting the hostages home, the aid in is something that surely we can all agree on. And that’s the spirit in which I’m ready to work,” Fletcher concluded.