Source : News Agencies / 18 Aug 2014

Thousands of Palestinians have been forcibly displaced from their own and only homes due to the ongoing Israeli military offensive that has been rocking besieged Gaza for over a month, a UN report revealed on Saturday.

According to a statement released on Saturday by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OCHA), the rate of Palestinians who have been displaced due to mounting Israeli acts of terror in Gaza has gone up to 218,000, all sheltering in 87 UN-run schools across the Gaza Strip.

Earlier, the Palestine Liberation Organization’s Gaza Under Fire Report announced “Over 485,000 people have been displaced (almost one third of the Gaza population) –1,800,000 people (the entire population of the Gaza Strip) have been affected by the destruction of electricity, water and waste water infrastructures.”

According to the UN report, alternative housing is currently needed for the approximately 100,000 people whose homes have either been completely destroyed or severely damaged.

A total of 230 schools have sustained some degree of damage, including 90 UNRWA schools. 25 schools have been razed to the ground, OCHA added.

According to the report, cash assistance of more than US$68 million is needed for some 16,792 families to cover rental fees and urgent expenses after having fallen prey to severe damage throughout the Gaza offensive.

OCHA warned of the deadly risks lying ahead of Gaza civilians, particularly children, farmers, rescue staffs, and refugees, due to the thousands of rocket-propelled grenades and unexploded ordnance left in residential communities and Gaza-based UN-run facilities.

On Sunday, medical authorities in Gaza said that the total death toll of the assault in Gaza had hit 2,016 and more than 10,193 injured, as dozens more Palestinians succumbed to wounds sustained during the bombardment.

Gaza-based spokesman for the Ministry of Health Ashraf al-Qidra told Ma'an that the massive increase in the number of dead also included a number of bodies that were pulled from the rubble as thousands of displaced families and rescue teams took advantage of the calm to return to their former homes.

Al-Qidra said that the dead included at least 541 children and 95 elderly, while 3,084 children and 368 elderly were among the wounded.

This comes as several Palestinians lost their lives in separate incidents after being run over by settlers in the occupied region over the past few days.

On Sunday, a Palestinian man was killed after being knocked down by an Israeli settler in al-Quds (Jerusalem).

Also on Thursday, Mohammed Abdel Karim Mohammed Abu Isleim, 23, was hit while he was trying to cross a street near the illegal settlement of Barkan in Salfit.

Separately, On August 7, a settler ran over and injured an 8-year-old Palestinian girl in the southern West Bank. 

Local Palestinian residents and witnesses said they believed the drivers had deliberately killed Palestinians.