One in five of Gaza’s population - that's nearly 500,000 people - are now facing “catastrophic levels of acute food insecurity” The Guardian reported, citing a draft report from the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), which is the United Nations hunger monitoring system.
According to the IPC, in March and April food deliveries reaching northern Gaza had successfully increased, helping to “avert” what seemed to be an unavoidable famine, but in recent weeks following renewed hostilities the situation has worsened and now a “high risk of famine persists across the whole of the Gaza Strip”. For instance, the report found that half of Gaza’s households have had to sell or trade their clothing for food.
“More than half [of households] also reported that, often, they do not have any food to eat in the house, and over 20% go entire days and nights without eating. The recent trajectory is negative and highly unstable. Should this continue, the improvements seen in April could be rapidly reversed," the report says.
Children of Gaza are experiencing the direct impact of “an extreme lack of food, starvation, and exhaustion”. In one instance, a baby named Majd who was born at a healthy weight of 3.5 kg (7.7 lbs), weighed about 3 kg less than what is normal for a baby his age in May when he was six months old, Reuters reported.
After suffering from malnutrition the baby had to be treated for an injection and given fortified milk to help bring his weight back up. After the hospital where the baby was staying was evacuated following an Israeli raid, the news agency was unable to trace Majd’s health for an update.
According to the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), one in three children in northern Gaza are acutely malnourished or experiencing emaciation. Ismail Al-Thawabta, the director of the Hamas-run government media office, believes a majority of malnutrition deaths in Gaza (29 of the 33 fatalities) have been children, but believes that number could be higher.
While Israeli forces have reportedly blocked aid deliveries into the famine-stricken region, more than a dozen Palestinians have also been tragically killed by airdrops of aid delivered by multiple nations. Some either died by drowning while trying to recover the food deliveries, while others were fatally struck by falling pallets with failed parachutes, according to a UN News report from April.
The IPC has not officially declared a famine, but will do so when 20% of households have an extreme lack of food, 30% of children suffer from acute malnutrition and two adults or four children per 10,000 people begin to die daily. A famine early warning system based in the US (Fews Net) said it was “possible, if not likely” that a famine in northern Gaza would begin in April, and two UN organizations have said more than 1 million Gazans were “expected to face death and starvation” by mid-July.
Among other alleged crimes, the International Criminal Court’s prosecutor accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant of using starvation of civilians as a warfare method.
"Since October 7 of last year the death toll from Israeli aggression has grown to 37,551 and 85,911 people were injured. Over the past 24 hours the occupation forces have committed three mass killings of families in the Gaza Strip that left 101 dead and 169 injured," the Gaza Health Ministry said in a statement on Sunday.