London, July 23 (RHC)-- An expert in the effects of Israel's genocidal war against the Palestinian people took part in recent protests in London, calling on the UK government to stop sending weapons to the Zionist regime. 

Hratche Koundarjian, from the War Child nongovernmental organisation, was among the people demonstrating in central London at the “Red Line for Gaza” protest that we reported on earlier.

He spoke with reporters about the physical and psychological effects of the war on the children in Gaza.  

“The stories we are hearing are horrific, beyond comprehension.  I think you can talk about the statistics of 17,000 children killed and the many hundreds of thousands more who’ve been injured, but the reality is the individual stories.  I was speaking to a colleague yesterday who had visited Gaza and spoke of children playing in the bombed sites of craters just a few minutes after a missile had struck."

The activist from the NGO War Child said: “The violence becomes so normalised that civilians are just trying to do their best to work around it.  War Child released a report last year that found about 94 percent of children in Gaza expect to die; nearly half hope for death.  This is the worst place in the war to be a child by far; it’s absolutely horrendous.  The situation needs to be resolved immediately.

“Normally, in a conflict, we would see roughly 20 percent of children experiencing some level of trauma – in Gaza, it’s every single child."

“Every single child would need the assistance of War Child and other organisations to deal with the trauma that’s been inflicted on them."

“It’s going to take decades to sort out this problem that’s being caused in a year and a half. It’s going to be an ongoing huge humanitarian response to deal with not just the basic needs but the massive mental health crisis that people there are experiencing.”

[ SOURCE:  AL JAZEERA ]