As Israel escalates war on Gaza, Red Cross urges halt to 'intolerable' human suffering

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has demanded a halt to the "intolerable" human suffering in the besieged Gaza Strip, as the Israeli regime escalates its now 22-day-old bloody war of aggression against the coastal territory.

"This is a catastrophic failing that the world must not tolerate," president of the ICRC, Mirjana Spoljaric, said on Saturday.

"I am shocked by the intolerable level of human suffering and urge the parties to the conflict to de-escalate now," she said, adding, "The tragic loss of so many civilian lives is deplorable."

The Israeli regime has been bombarding Gaza since October 7, when fighters from the Gaza Strip-based resistance groups launched a large-scale operation against the occupying entity in response to its intensified crimes against the Palestinian people.

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The death toll in Gaza has since exceeded 8,000, including more than 3,000 children, with more than 20,500 wounded.

Despite the unconscionable toll, Tel Aviv has declared that the war has "entered a new phase." The regime is, meanwhile, imposing a complete siege on Gaza, preventing the flow of water, gas, medicines, and electricity into the territory.

"It is unacceptable that civilians have no safe place to go in Gaza amid the massive bombardments, and with a military siege in place there is also no adequate humanitarian response currently possible," Spoljaric said.

She was speaking hours after UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres sharply criticized the "unprecedented escalation" of bombardments on Gaza, calling for an "immediate" ceasefire.

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk also warned on Saturday that there was the potential for thousands more civilians to die if Israel pressed ahead with a ground offensive in Gaza.

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Tel Aviv has been threatening to launch a ground invasion against Gaza while rejecting all calls for a ceasefire, claiming it would benefit the resistance movement of Hamas.

The UN General Assembly overwhelmingly passed a resolution on Friday, calling for the implementation of an immediate "humanitarian truce" in Gaza.

The vote at the General Assembly came after the United Nations Security Council failed four times in the past two weeks to take action due to the US' recurrently casting its veto against relevant resolutions.

The assembly stressed the "importance of preventing further destabilization and escalation of violence in the region," calling on "all parties to exercise maximum restraint and upon all those with influence on them to work toward this objective."

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