"Failure to meet children's basic needs in Gaza is trapping them in an endless cycle of suffering.
"The experiences of the desperate parents I met this past week can illustrate this better than I could:
"Hind hasn't slept since her four-year-old daughter, Masa, was bitten by a rat during the night.
"Like many families, they sheltered wherever they could - in their case, the second floor of a building block where sewage water leaks through the ceilings, and rodents crawl through the cracks in the building and climb the exposed pipes.
"Amani's daughter, Lemar, she's 7, has developed deep lesions and sores on her head, back and legs due to a bacterial infection. Amani tries to clean her wounds each day with the little, hard-to-get, clean water she has, as her daughter screams in agony.
"Abdallah's mother told me that he has developed a skin infection as they live in a tent next to sand contaminated with faeces. His mother has spoken to doctors and desperately needs the medication and enough clean water and hygiene products to help him heal and protect him from exposure to more infections.
"Abdel Aleem said that his 8 months old son, Ahmad, and his pregnant sister-in-law were both bitten a couple of weeks ago. They have layered sandbags around the outside of the tent to try to protect themselves, but the rats simply chew through it - stopping them is futile.
"The common thread running through every one of these conversations is the sheer heartbreak of parents who no longer feel able to do the thing most innate to them - protect their children's health and safety.
"One look at the conditions that people are being forced to live in is enough to understand why.
"We know that Gaza was already one of the most densely populated places in the world. Now, people have been crammed into around 40 per cent of the space left to them - sheltering among broken buildings, rubble and mounting solid waste.
"Families across Gaza do not have enough clean water, they are forced to choose between drinking, washing and cooking with what little they have.
"UNICEF is trying to reach as many people as possible with clean water- up to one and a half million people a month - but there are significant obstacles:
"Firstly - deadly attacks on water operations, including recently at Al Mansoura filling point, where two UNICEF-contracted truck drivers were killed whilst trying to collect water. Now, this main water filling station - which more than a quarter of a million people rely on - is inaccessible.
"Secondly, items needed to sustain water systems and repair damaged water infrastructure - including: lubricant oil, water treatment chemicals and spare parts - are not being allowed in at the scale needed, meaning we cannot repair systems as quickly as needed to reach more children with clean water, and existing systems risk failure due to lack of maintenance and overuse. If we cannot repair systems, then we have to rely solely on water trucking which is much more expensive and doesn't reach populations as effectively.
"Thirdly, solid waste is piling up by the day. This, alongside rubble, needs clearing at a scale that is currently impossible because there is no accessible space left to clear it to.
"The effects of this are now widely apparent: children with respiratory infections, acute watery diarrhea, and more than half of all households reporting skin diseases. Fleas, lice, and scabies are commonplace. Increasing numbers of children are requiring hospitalization. All without a single fully functioning hospital across Gaza.
"The picture is similarly stark when it comes to children's nutrition. While we have managed to reverse the famine, the number of malnourished and vulnerable children remain extremely serious. More than two years of food insecurity, poor housing, limited water, terrible sanitary conditions and regular disease outbreaks has left the population extremely vulnerable. Without enough clean water and fuel to cook proper meals, even children who recover with treatment will quickly fall back in a cycle of malnutrition - the effects of which can last a lifetime.
"No parent should be in a position where they cannot provide their child with the basic needs to keep them healthy. No parent should have to watch as their child writhes in pain from lesions or buckle from weakness because of entirely preventable diarrhoea. That this is happening should be - to everyone - entirely unconscionable.
"Access to water, adequate nutritious food, and health care should not be conditional for any child, anywhere.
"UNICEF is calling for safe unfettered access to deliver humanitarian operations, the lifting of restrictions on items needed to quickly repair and sustain water and sanitation systems, and for international humanitarian law to be upheld.
"Only then will children in Gaza start to break free from the cycle of suffering they are trapped in."
