GENEVA – More aid workers, health workers, delivery workers and other humanitarians were killed in 2024 than in any other year, the United Nations reported Friday.

Bloodshed in the Middle East is the leading cause of 281 humanitarian deaths worldwide this year, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

“Even before the end of the year, 2024 has become the deadliest year on record for humanitarian workers worldwide,” said OCHA spokesperson Jens Laerke. He told reporters in Geneva the figure surpassed the previous record of 280 deaths for the whole of last year.

Humanitarians “work with courage and selflessness in places like Gaza, Sudan, Lebanon, Ukraine, etc. They are showing off the best humanity has to offer, and they are being killed in return – in record numbers,” he said.

“These figures will send shock waves through the humanitarian community, particularly on the front lines of the response,” he added.

The U.N. said the figures come from the Aid Worker Safety Database, a U.S.-funded project run by a Britain-based group called Humanitarian Outcomes.

In total, 268 of the humanitarians killed – including non-UN organizations like the Red Cross and Red Crescent – ​​were national staff, while 13 were international staff.

Some 230 aid workers were killed in occupied Palestinian areas, the database showed on Friday. It was not clear whether this was in Gaza or the West Bank.

Laerke said threats against aid workers “extend beyond Gaza, with high levels of violence, injuries from kidnappings, harassment and arbitrary detentions” reported in Afghanistan, Congo, Sudan in the South, in Sudan, Ukraine, Yemen and elsewhere.

OCHA said a total of 333 humanitarian workers have been killed since the latest conflict between Israel and the Hamas militant group erupted when the militants stormed into southern Israel on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people. , mostly civilians. and removing 250 more.

The death toll in the Gaza Strip since the 13 month war has surpassed 44,000, local health officials announced Thursday. Gaza’s health ministry does not distinguish between civilians and fighters in its tally, but it has said more than half of the dead are women and children. The Israeli army claims to have killed more than 17,000 militants, without providing evidence.