No fewer than 17,000 Palestinian children and young people are living in the Gaza Strip without their parents or siblings, the UN children’s aid organisation UNICEF said on Friday.

Israel has been bombarding the coastal strip to root out the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, which controls Gaza.

The Islamist group Hamas launched terrorist attacks on Israel on October 7, which killed more than 1,200 people.

Israel’s response has now left over 27,000 Gaza people dead, according to the Hamas-controlled health authority.

Meanwhile, children’s parents in the strip have either been killed, injured or have had to move elsewhere, UNICEF spokesman for the region Jonathan Crickx said.

“Palestinian children’s mental health is severely impacted; they show symptoms like extremely high levels of persistent anxiety, loss of appetite, inability to sleep, they have emotional outbursts, or they panic every time they hear a bombing.

“These children don’t have anything to do with this conflict. Yet they are suffering; no child should suffer.

“Not a single child, whatever the religion, nationality, language or race, should ever be exposed to the level of violence seen on October 7 or to the level of violence that we have witnessed since then.

“With some children, it is not known who they belong to. They are still too young or are in such a state of shock that they cannot say their name,” said Mr Crickx.

Two related children, six and four years old, both lost practically their entire families at the beginning of December, Mr Crickx said, adding that the four-year-old child is in complete shock.

(dpa/NAN)