The Executive Director of the World Health Organization's Health Emergencies Programme has called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza so that "unhindered, unfettered humanitarian relief" can enter the besieged Palestinian enclave.
Speaking to Prime Time from Cairo, Dr Michael Ryan said agencies need unhindered humanitarian access to civilians in Gaza, especially those who require medical assistance.
"What we need to do is put humanity back at the centre of this process, and we need to take the violence out and we need to get humanitarian access. We need a humanitarian pause, and we need safe passage for our supplies," Dr Ryan said.
"What’s unfolding right now in Gaza is a humanitarian and health catastrophe," Dr Ryan told Prime Time. "The situation is beyond belief."
"Anyone in Ireland can imagine what it would be like in Dublin or even Galway or in Cork if the hospital shut down, if there was no electricity and there was no water, there was no food, if there was no fuel," Dr Ryan said.
Watch: Prime Time's Miriam O'Callaghan speaks to Dr Mike Ryan
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Dr Ryan said 66% of those killed by Israeli airstrikes so far in Gaza have been women and children.
"These are not combatants; these are not people fighting a war." Dr Ryan said.
"They're not part of this war. And they need to be protected, as is clear, under international humanitarian law. Even war has rules."
In the wake of the unprecedented murderous attacks into southern Israel by Hamas, the group which controls Gaza, on October 7, Israel cut electricity, water and fuel to Gaza.
Hospitals have been running on backup generators and the fuel for them is running out, Dr Ryan said.
Two-thirds of primary health care centers are now closed, and many hospitals are out of action, with critical medical supplies, like insulin and anesthetics, also running low, Dr Ryan said.
"Supplies are running low. We have pregnant women. We have people with disabilities. We have people on dialysis. We have people on cancer therapy," Dr Ryan said.
"You think about it, we need about 94,000 litres of fuel per day to run these hospitals. We're running on a trickle," he said.
Following orders from the Israeli military for people living in the area around Gaza City to evacuate to the south of the Wadi Gaza, a wetlands in the centre of the strip, hundreds of thousands of people are displaced and sheltering in hospitals and other facilities.
Dr Ryan says there are over 600,000 people crowded into UN facilities, effectively. "They were never meant to be displaced persons facilities," Dr Ryan said.
"There are thousands of people sheltering at the hospital, the Al-Shifa Hospital alone has over 30,000 civilians sheltering on the grounds of the hospital," Dr Ryan said.
Dr Ryan said WHO teams on the ground report to him that the "smell of death in the place is just unreal. It's very hard to describe the reality for the civilians on the ground in Gaza. Very, very hard to put it into words."
Asked about the Israeli military’s claims that Hamas should provide fuel to hospitals in Gaza, Dr Ryan said WHO’s interest "is in the civilian people on both sides of this conflict. Our interest here is to create a humanitarian pause, a ceasefire."
"Civilians have paid the terrible price in Israel. Civilians are paid terrible price in Gaza and are paying that price. And our colleagues and our brothers and sisters in the system are paying their price as well."
Dr Ryan’s warnings come as the UN's humanitarian chief has also warned that aid "is barely trickling" into Gaza as the world is "failing to meet the bare entitlements of a part of humanity".
Martin Griffiths, the UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, says that "heavy bombardments on Gaza continue and are getting worse, even in areas supposed to be safer".
In a post on X, formerly Twitter, Griffiths says "the rules of war are clear" that civilians must be protected and have the essentials to survive.
An interview with Dr Ryan features on the Thursday 26 October edition of Prime Time, which can be watched on RTÉ Player.
