Even before October 7, there were concerning incidents. For example, someone I worked with in New York had a colleague who talked aggressively about Jews, saying, "Why are Jews even at the UN?". There was the fact that Jewish high holy days were initially denied as official days off after staff requested them to be included in the NY office, which has a large Jewish population, although the Muslim holiday Eid was included as two official days off.

But after October 7, it was like a veil came down, and it was a free-for-all. UNICEF hadn't made any official comments yet or issued any official statements, including well into late October. We were pretty much told what we could and couldn't say publicly. But internally, you could say whatever you wanted—it didn't matter. Staff were going back and forth in team chats during meetings and posting on social media with their official titles, with all kinds of comments and statements, using words from early October on, like "genocide," "ethnic cleansing," "apartheid," and "famine." This was flying around and continued— with virtually no discussion about the hostages or even the word Hamas being used. For a while, UNICEF only said, "all parties of the conflict' without referencing Hamas.

I asked, early on, during an divisional meeting, "Why are we not saying Hamas? We say Israel—why are we not saying what Hamas is doing?" There was no reply.

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