U.S. official: Famine strikes Gaza

JERUSALEM — Samantha Power, the administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, told lawmakers this week a famine is underway in the northern Gaza Strip, which has been devastated by six months of Israeli military operations and is the part of the territory most cut off from aid.

Power’s statement made her the first senior U.S. official to publicly identified the hunger crisis in Gaza as a famine. But her agency, known as USAID, later sought to temper Power’s comments, clarifying her assessment was based on data collected in March, not on new information.

“While there has not been a new assessment, conditions remain dire,” USAID said in a statement Thursday.

Aid agencies and global experts have warned for months nearly all 2.2 million Palestinians in Gaza would soon face extreme hunger.

Power, whose comments came during a congressional testimony Wednesday, was citing a March report from the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification initiative, a group of U.N. agencies and relief agencies also known as the IPC, the USAID statement said.

That report said northern Gaza, the first part of the territory Israeli forces invaded in October, could tip into famine between mid-March and May.

The northern part of the enclave has been heavily damaged by the war and is far from the two open border crossings in the south through which nearly all aid is arriving.

During her congressional testimony Wednesday, Power was asked by Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-Texas, about reports her agency had sent a cable to the National Security Council saying famine had begun in parts of Gaza. The cable was first reported by HuffPost.

“Do you think it is plausible or likely that parts of Gaza, and in particular northern Gaza, are already experiencing famine?” Castro asked.

Power said that appeared to be the case and cited the IPC report, whose methodology she described as sound.

At the time, she did not specify which IPC report she was referring to.

“That is their assessment, and we believe that assessment is credible,” Power said.

“So famine is already occurring there?” Castro replied. “That is — yes,” Power said. Power said later in her testimony the rate of severe malnutrition among children in Gaza had become “markedly worse” since Oct. 7.

In interviews, people in northern Gaza have described severe food shortages. Even in Beit Lahia, once known as Gaza’s breadbasket, people’s diets sometimes amount to little more than boiled bitter weeds, said Yousef Sager, 24, a farmer.