UNRWA urges Israel to allow access into northern Gaza for lifesaving rescue operations

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) on Monday called on Israeli authorities to allow its team to enter northern Gaza to carry out lifesaving rescue missions amid an ongoing Israeli deadly incursion that has lasted over two weeks.

In a statement, UNRWA said it reiterates an urgent demand by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) to Israeli authorities "to allow access in order to carry out lifesaving rescue operations in (northern) Gaza, including the recovery of people trapped under rubble."

UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini earlier on Monday said that Israel is prohibiting the entry of humanitarian aid into northern Gaza.

Meanwhile, the Palestinian Civil Defense said in a separate statement on Monday that more than 600 people have been killed since Israel began its ongoing military offensive in the northern Gaza Strip more than two weeks ago.

"The bodies of dozens of dead people are still under the rubble and on the streets as civil defense teams can't reach them," spokesman Mahmoud Basal told Anadolu.

The Israeli army has continued its massive offensive in northern Gaza, which is now on its 17th day, amid a suffocating siege.

The onslaught was the latest episode in Israel's brutal onslaught that has killed more than 42,600 people, mostly women and children, and injured 99,800 others since last year following a Hamas attack.

The Israeli war on Gaza has displaced almost the territory's entire population amid an ongoing blockade that has led to severe shortages of food, clean water, and medicine.

Israel faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its actions in Gaza.