Geneva, 12 December 2025 – Storm Byron, a severe storm system that triggered flooding in Greece and Cyprus before reaching Gaza earlier this week, has now made landfall, bringing heavy rainfall that has already flooded multiple displacement sites and placed nearly 795,000* displaced Palestinians at heightened risk.
Flooding in Gaza has damaged shelters and left families exposed to rising risks. Photo: IOM 2025
Rainfall is expected to continue in the hours ahead, further straining conditions for families already living in unsafe shelters.
Responding to EU home affairs ministers’ position on the EU Return Regulation agreed in Brussels on , Olivia Sundberg Diez, EU Advocate on Migration and Asylum at Amnesty International, said:
“EU ministers’ position on the Return Regulation reveals the EU’s dogged and misguided insistence on ramping up deportations, raids, surveillance, and detention at any cost…
… These punitive measures amount to an unprecedented stripping of rights based on migration status and will leave more people in precarious situations and legal limbo.
Gaza City, 8 December 2025 – One month into the latest ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, a fragile calm has brought long-awaited relief for families who have endured unimaginable suffering and repeated displacement.
For the third time in over two years, after previously collapsed ceasefires, there is a small space for hope – a renewed opportunity for survival, safety, and dignity for nearly 2 million Palestinians.
Thousands of families remain without a roof over their heads. For months on end, many have lain awake beneath the open sky.
Ensuring full humanitarian access is essential for Gaza’s fragile ceasefire to lead to meaningful recovery. Photo: IOM 2025
Select your languagEnsuring full humanitarian access is essential for Gaza’s fragile ceasefire to lead to meaningful recovery. Photo: IOM 2025
(Washington, DC) – Human rights groups on 8 December 2025 urged US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to end immigration detention at Camp East Montana, a massive tent camp at the Fort Bliss military base in El Paso, Texas.
In their letter, advocates summarized accounts of horrific conditions, including beatings and sexual abuse by officers against detained immigrants, beatings and coercive threats to compel deportation to third countries, medical neglect, hunger and insufficient food, and denial of meaningful access to counsel, among other rights violations.
(UN News)* —Mothers who’ve been left starving in Gaza are now giving birth to underweight or premature babies who die in intensive care units or struggle to survive as they endure acute malnutrition, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) warned on Tuesday [].
Speaking from the shattered enclave, UNICEF Communication Manager Tess Ingram said that at least 165 children are reported to have died “painful, preventable deaths” related to malnutrition during the war between Hamas fighters and Israel.
A lesser-known scourge is acute hunger among pregnant and breastfeeding women and “the devastating domino effect” of this lack of a healthy diet on thousands of newborns.
(UN News)* —Nahed was visiting Sudan’s capital Khartoum with her family to celebrate Eid, a major Islamic holiday, when the war broke out between the rival armies vying for control of her homeland.
(UN News)* —The world is witnessing an alarming erosion of respect for international law, with conflicts increasingly targeting civilians and heightening the risk of atrocity crimes, warns the United Nations’ newly appointed Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide.
UN Photo/Ariana Lindquist | Chaloka Beyani (at podium), Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide, addresses the dedication of the “Flower of Srebrenica” Memorial at UN Headquarters honouring the victims of the 1995 genocide in Srebrenica.
In his first interview since assuming the post in August, Chaloka Beyani reflected on the origins of his mandate, created by the UN Security Council in the wake of the genocides in Rwanda and Srebrenica, and drew sobering parallels with the crises unfolding today.
(UN News)* — The UN agency that assists Palestine refugees, UNRWA, said that Israeli police raided its compound in East Jerusalem early on Monday [], representing “a new challenge to international law.”
UNRWA | UNRWA Headquarters in East Jerusalem. (file)
Israeli police accompanied by municipal officials forcibly entered the facility, UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini wrote on the social media platform X.
Police motorcycles, trucks and forklifts were brought in and all communications were cut, he said, while furniture, IT equipment and other property were seized.
The UN flag was pulled down and replaced with an Israeli flag.
Geneva, 8 December 2025 – The International Organization for Migration (IOM) has launched its 2026 Global Appeal, requesting USD 4.7 billion to assist 41 million people on the move and to reinforce the systems that make migration safe, orderly, and regular.
Every year, more than 200,000 migrants take the perilous journey from Djibouti’s coast. Photo credit IOM 2024/ Andi Pratiwi
The Appeal highlights a simple yet urgent reality: people move in search of protection, opportunity and stability, and these needs require sustained, principled support.
(UN News)* — The deadly legacy of conflicts old and new – from Gaza to Sudan and beyond – continues to kill and maim civilians on a near-daily basis, mine action workers said on 3 December 2025, as they appealed for greater support for their lifesaving work in the face of deep funding cuts.
Speaking on the sidelines of a key international meeting in support of landmine action taking place at UN Geneva, experts in the field explained how shrinking resources in Afghanistan and Nigeria have exposed civilians to unexploded ordnance.
HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 