A/80/496 28 October 2024, limiting access to crucial humanitarian aid and assistance and contributing to extraordinarily perilous conditions for thousands of local Palestinian staff. 37 This deliberate obstruction of humanitarian work, even amid an unprecedented humanitarian crisis, demonstrates the depth and persistence of anti -Palestinian racism. In addition to the deliberate denial of access to essential services as a method of warfare, conflict commonly disrupts civilian access to essential goods and services, including food, clean water and sanitation, adequate housing, education and health, resulting in additional deaths. 38 24. Conflict and the lack of access to essential services also often cause endemic non-fatal injuries, which can have lifelong consequences, including disability. 39 As will be detailed in the subsequent section, international humanitarian law and human rights law provide protection to civilians in situations of conflict. Unfortunately, many State and non-State actors have repeatedly violated international humanitaria n law and human rights law, systemically undermining its provisions. This has led to a deeply disturbing paradox whereby the more protections within international humanitarian law and human rights are violated, the more normalized large -scale civilian harm and human rights violations become. 25. Marginalized racial and ethnic groups can be disproportionately affected by the civilian harm associated with international and non -international armed conflicts, as well as broader forms of systemic societal violence. This is due to the vulnerabilities arising from their positionality and experiences of pre-existing systemic racism and intersectional discrimination, which are often legacies of enslavement and/or manifestations of past or ongoing colonialism, occupation and apartheid. 40 The majority of current violent conflicts are occurring in Africa, the Middle East and South Asia, 41 which are regions with significant experiences of colonialism, enslavement and apartheid. Between 1980 and 2016, Africa had by far the highest proportion of civilian fatalities, with nearly 87 per cent of all reported civilian global fatalities. 42 Given the information received by the Special Rapporteur about the disproportionate impact of civilian harm on those from marginalized racial and ethnic groups, she is concerned about a paucity of racially and ethnically disaggregated data to measure and monitor the impact of conflicts. 26. One of the most effective ways to reduce civilian harm and its racially and ethnically disproportionate impact is through the taking of comprehensive conflict prevention measures, as described above. State and non-State actors, in particular armed groups, can also minimize civilian harm by exercising restraint in all conflict situations and fully respecting and upholding applicable human rights and international humanitarian law standards, as well as by ensuring unrestricted and non-discriminatory access to all forms of humanitarian aid. States and private sector actors can also contribute to the reduction of civilian harm by taking steps to prevent, address and mitigate the negative human rights impacts of arms transfers, 43 in __________________ 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 10/21 United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), “UNRWA situation report #180 on the humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem”, 18 July 2025; communication ISR 3/2025; and OHCHR, “Gaza: Israel must restore UN humanitarian system to stave off starvation, say UN experts”, 7 August 2025. See S/2025/389. Alice Priddy, “Who is the civilian population? Ensuring IHL is implemented for the protection of the entirety of the civilian population – including persons with disabilities”, International Review of the Red Cross, vol. 105, No. 922 (Cambridge University Press, 2022). Submission from South Africa. United Nations and World Bank, Pathways for Peace. Ibid. See A/HRC/58/41; and United Nations Working Group on Business and Human Rights, “Responsible business conduct in the arms sector: ensuring business practice in line with the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights”, August 2022. 25-16958