Girls walk with water containers past destroyed buildings and a puddle of sewage water erupting from collapsed underground pipes in Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip on July 8, 2024. AFP
Lazzarini's remarks came in a joint press conference in Cairo with Egypt’s newly appointed Minister of Foreign Affairs, Emigration, and Egyptian Expatriates Affairs Badr Abdelatty.
"Today half of Gaza's population is below 18 years old, with 600,000 girls and boys living amidst the rubble, deeply traumatised," he said.
"Education has always been a source of pride for Palestinians," Lazzarini emphasized. "It has been the only thing that has not been taken away from the Palestinians. It has been the path for a better future."
According to UN statistics, Palestinian communities have a 98 percent literacy rate.
However, in the meantime, an entire generation faces the risk of being deprived of education, Lazzarini lamented. "That's why it's crucial that beyond saving lives and securing a ceasefire, we urgently reintegrate these children into an educational environment."
"It's not about returning to schools tomorrow — because most of them have been destroyed — but about bringing them into an education setting if we don't want to contribute to more resentment, more despair, more extremism in the future,” he affirmed.
Moreover, Lazzarini underscored the devastating toll on UNRWA facilities: "Since the beginning of the war, over 50 percent of UNRWA installations have been hit or damaged."
"We have lost nearly 200 staff members and, just this week, witnessed another tragic attack on an UNRWA school sheltering thousands of displaced Palestinians," he noted.
For two consecutive days, Israel has raided schools sheltering displaced families, killing at least 10 people.
"There is no viable alternative to UNRWA's educational role on such a scale unless a state capable of providing these services steps in," Lazzarini stressed.
Dismantling UNRWA in the absence of functional governance would mean denying children access to education, he said, referring to Israel’s attempt to undermine the agency and put an end to its mission with the Palestinian refugees.
According to figures from the Palestinian Ministry of Education, at least 8,672 students have been killed in the occupied Palestinian territories and 14,583 have been injured since the beginning of the Israeli war on Gaza.
In a statement on Tuesday, the ministry said more than 8,572 of this number have been killed in Gaza, with 14,089 injured.
Additionally, 100 students have been killed and 494 injured in the West Bank, in addition to 349 arrests.
According to WAFA news agency, the Palestinian Ministry of Education and Higher Education also revealed that 497 teachers and administrators have been killed and 3,402 injured in Gaza and the West Bank, with more than 109 arrested in the West Bank.
It also noted that 353 government schools, universities, and university buildings, along with 65 facilities belonging to the UNRWA, have been targeted by Israeli bombing in Gaza.
Moreover, Israel has completely destroyed 93 schools, while 57 other schools in the West Bank have been stormed and vandalized.
The UNICEF also reported that more than 50 schools, including several UNRWA schools, have been destroyed since the war began, and at least 13,750 Palestinian children have lost their lives, with 17,000 more unaccompanied or separated from their families.
UNRWA has been the main provider of primary and pre-secondary education for over 300,000 girls and boys in pre-war Gaza, according to the UN data.
"Every day, 10 children lose limbs, and dozens succumb to malnutrition and dehydration,” the UNICEF added.
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