GENEVA

The World Health Organization (WHO) chief on Wednesday called on Israel to allow the delivery of aid and ensure safe passage to Gaza, saying that over the last two weeks the UN agency had to call off several missions to the besieged enclave.   

"WHO has had to cancel six planned missions to northern Gaza since the 26th of December, when we had our last mission, because our requests were rejected and assurances of safe passage were not provided," Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a press conference.

"A mission planned for today has also been cancelled," Tedros added, totaling the number of rejections to seven since late December.

He underlined that the only barrier to delivering humanitarian aid to people in Gaza is access.

"We have the supplies, the teams, and the plans in place. What we don’t have is access," he said, adding that delivering such aid is facing "nearly insurmountable challenges" due to intense bombardment, restrictions on movement, fuel shortages, and interrupted communications.

He urged: "We call on Israel to approve requests by WHO and other partners to deliver humanitarian aid."

He reiterated his call for a cease-fire, but underlined that "even without one, corridors can be established to allow the safe passage of humanitarian aid and workers."

Israel has pounded the Palestinian enclave since a cross-border attack by the Palestinian group Hamas on Oct. 7, killing at least 23,357 Palestinians, most of them women and children, and injuring 59,410 others, according to local health authorities.

Around 1,200 Israelis are believed to have been killed in the Hamas offensive.

About 85% of Gazans have been displaced, while all of them are food insecure, according to the UN. Hundreds of thousands of people are living without shelter, and the aid trucks entering the territory are ⁠less than half than before the conflict.