FAMINE ‘IMMINENT’ IN GAZA UNLESS AID BLOCKADE LIFTED
▶ UN-backed report issues warning as relief chief says world should ‘hang its head in shame’
A record number of Palestinians are living in acute hunger in Gaza, with famine set to hit the enclave imminently if a ceasefire is not reached and aid delivered, a UN-backed report warned yesterday.
The number of people facing “catastrophic hunger” in Gaza has risen to 1.1 million – about half the population – the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification report said.
“The latest evidence confirms that famine is imminent in the northern governorates and projected to occur anytime between mid-March and May 2024,” it said.
The city of Deir Al Balah in central Gaza and the southern cities of Khan Younis and Rafah are expected to face famine by July, the report said.
The enclave’s population faces high levels of acute food insecurity, it said, with the “most likely scenario” projecting half of Gazans will face famine by mid-July, an increase of 92 per cent from the last analysis.
“The famine threshold for household acute food insecurity has already been far exceeded,” the report said. The number of non-trauma deaths is also expected to rise as starvation spreads, it added.
Gaza was already highly dependent on aid before war broke out on October 7, when Hamas militants attacked Israeli communities, killing about 1,200 people and abducting 240.
Israel’s retaliatory strikes and ground incursion have killed more than 31,700 people. Adding to Palestinians’ hardships, aid deliveries into Gaza – which are controlled by Israel – have been reduced to a trickle.
Only 60 lorries carrying food aid entered Gaza between October 7 and February 24, the report said, down from a daily average of more than 500.
“Virtually all households are skipping meals every day and adults are reducing their meals so children can eat. In the northern governorates, in nearly two thirds of the households, people went entire days and nights without eating at least 10 times in the last 30 days,” it said.
At least 27 people, most of them children, have starved to death in Gaza’s hospitals, according to the enclave’s Health Ministry.
Ted Chaiban, the UN children’s fund’s deputy executive director, said youngsters were now dying “a slow, painful death” caused by malnutrition and dehydration.
Mr Chaiban, speaking at the European Humanitarian Forum, added: “We know of 23 children in the north of the Gaza Strip, according to reports we have received from hospitals, who have died due to malnutrition and dehydration.”
Palestinians have resorted to grinding animal feed to make flour.
Hundreds of others have been shot dead by the Israeli military while waiting for food aid, health officials have said.
UN relief chief Martin Griffiths said the international community must “flood” Gaza with aid to avert full-scale famine. “Famine is imminent in Gaza. More than one million people are at risk because they have been cut off from life-saving aid, markets have collapsed, and fields have been destroyed,” Mr Griffiths said on social media.
“The international community should hang its head in shame for failing to stop this.
“We know that once famine is declared, it is way too late. With
action and goodwill, it can be averted.”
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said Israel’s military campaign had turned the blockaded enclave from the world’s “greatest openair prison” into its biggest “open-air graveyard”, and accused Israel of using famine as a “weapon of war”.
Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said his country “allows extensive humanitarian aid into Gaza” and accused Mr Borrell of “attacking Israel”.
Fears of an impending famine in Gaza grew further last month when the World Food Programme suspended aid deliveries to the north of the enclave, saying its convoys had been shot at by the Israeli army and overwhelmed by civilians desperate for assistance.
Oxfam yesterday accused Israel of “deliberately” hindering aid deliveries into the enclave.
Israel’s actions have made the efforts of humanitarian organisations in Gaza “dangerous and dysfunctional”, the charity said.
In recent weeks, several countries have joined a Jordanian-led initiative to drop aid into Gaza from the air, while ships sailing from the US and Cyprus have taken several hundred tonnes of food to the enclave.
However, humanitarian organisations have said the amount of food being delivered does not come close to meeting the needs of Gaza’s 2.3 million population.
As the shortage of food continues, civilians in northern Gaza say they have resorted to feeding their children wild herbs they find growing around their homes and camps.
“My children are crying. They want real food,” resident Haitham Hamoda told