At least 21,000 children in Gaza have been disabled since the war between Israel and Hamas began on October 7, 2023, a United Nations committee said on Wednesday.
Around 40,500 children have suffered "new war-related injuries" in the nearly two years since the war erupted, with more than half of them left disabled, said the UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
Reviewing the situation in the Palestinian territories, it said Israeli evacuation orders during the army's offensive in Gaza were "often inaccessible" to people with hearing or visual impairments, "rendering evacuation impossible".
"Reports also described people with disabilities being forced to flee in unsafe and undignified conditions, such as crawling through sand or mud without mobility assistance," it said.
Meanwhile, the committee said the restrictions on humanitarian aid being brought into the Gaza Strip were disproportionately impacting the disabled.
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