Yemen Govt, UN Coordinate Efforts to Save Health Sector

Yemen Govt, UN Coordinate Efforts to Save Health Sector
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Yemen Govt, UN Coordinate Efforts to Save Health Sector

Yemen Govt, UN Coordinate Efforts to Save Health Sector

The Yemeni government, represented by Prime Minister Maeen Abdulmalik, has called for taking UN measures as part of the bilateral coordination to save the health sector, said official Yemeni sources.

Sources noted that it has also demanded to put mechanisms that would allow prioritizing the battle against novel coronavirus outbreak and supporting workers in the health system.

This came during a virtual meeting including Abdulmalik, UN envoy to Yemen Martin Griffiths UN Resident Coordinator Lise Grande and the World Health Organization representative in Yemen.

The meeting tackled coordination with the government to confront the pandemic in Yemen, the existing challenges and obstacles in this regard and the urgent support needed in the health sector to protect doctors, nurses, volunteers, and workers, as well as coordination of efforts to spread awareness, sources said.

Saba news agency quoted Abdulmalik as stressing the lack of funding that requires more effective work in terms of responding to the actual need on ground.

The Premier said the response shall be swift and coordinated between the government and the UN and active organizations.

He called for formulating a mechanism that would allow rearranging priorities and providing support to confront the pandemic, which threatens the lives of thousands of Yemenis.

The health sector has lost a lot of its capabilities over the past years as a result of the war triggered by the Iranian-backed Houthi militias, he noted.

“Yemenis have also faced the harsh humanitarian situation and suffered from malnutrition and low immunity, as well as the accumulation of displaced people and other war outcomes.”

He indicated that there is “an urgent need to install programs to support the health sector, including providing incentives and necessary protection for workers, in order to restore the workers’ and the community’s confidence in the sector.”

Abdulmalik praised an initiative by the international humanitarian group, “Doctors without Borders,” to run al-Amal quarantine center in Buraiqa district.

He stressed the importance of having similar initiatives in hospitals and quarantine centers to be managed by specialized organizations or partnerships with a private sector specialized with foreign support, enhancing the role of these facilities to better respond to the pandemic.

According to official sources, the Premier urged the “international community to support efforts to confront a number of epidemics that have spread in Aden and other areas, prompting the government to declare Aden an infected city”.



Israeli Missile Hits Gaza Children Collecting Water

A Palestinian woman reacts as a young man carries the body of her child killed in an Israeli strike, in front of Gaza City's Maamadani (Baptist) hospital on July 13, 2025. (Photo by Omar AL-QATTAA / AFP)
A Palestinian woman reacts as a young man carries the body of her child killed in an Israeli strike, in front of Gaza City's Maamadani (Baptist) hospital on July 13, 2025. (Photo by Omar AL-QATTAA / AFP)
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Israeli Missile Hits Gaza Children Collecting Water

A Palestinian woman reacts as a young man carries the body of her child killed in an Israeli strike, in front of Gaza City's Maamadani (Baptist) hospital on July 13, 2025. (Photo by Omar AL-QATTAA / AFP)
A Palestinian woman reacts as a young man carries the body of her child killed in an Israeli strike, in front of Gaza City's Maamadani (Baptist) hospital on July 13, 2025. (Photo by Omar AL-QATTAA / AFP)

At least eight Palestinians, most of them children, were killed and more than a dozen were wounded in central Gaza when they went to collect water on Sunday, local officials said.

The Israeli military said the missile had intended to hit an Islamic Jihad militant in the area but that a malfunction had caused it to fall "dozens of meters from the target".

"The IDF regrets any harm to uninvolved civilians," it said in a statement, adding that the incident was under review.

The strike hit a water distribution point in Nuseirat refugee camp, killing six children and injuring 17 others, said Ahmed Abu Saifan, an emergency physician at Al-Awda Hospital.

Water shortages in Gaza have worsened sharply in recent weeks, with fuel shortages causing desalination and sanitation facilities to close, making people dependent on collection centers where they can fill up their plastic containers.

Hours later, 12 people were killed by an Israeli strike on a market in Gaza City, including a prominent hospital consultant, Ahmad Qandil, Palestinian media reported. The Israeli military did not immediately comment on the attack.

Gaza's health ministry said on Sunday that more than 58,000 people had been killed since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas in October 2023, with 139 people added to the death toll over the past 24 hours.

Negotiations aimed at securing a ceasefire appeared to be deadlocked, with the two sides divided over the extent of an eventual Israeli withdrawal from the Palestinian enclave, Palestinian and Israeli sources said at the weekend.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was set to convene ministers late on Sunday to discuss the latest developments in the talks, an Israeli official said.

The indirect talks over a US proposal for a 60-day ceasefire are being held in Doha, but optimism that surfaced last week of a looming deal has largely faded, with both sides accusing each other of intransigence.

Netanyahu in a video he posted on Telegram on Sunday said Israel would not back down from its core demands - releasing all the hostages still in Gaza, destroying Hamas and ensuring Gaza will never again be a threat to Israel.