WHO warns of ‘surge’ in malnutrition deaths in Gaza

The World Health Organization (WHO) has warned against a deadly hunger crisis in the Gaza Strip, with the agency’s chief stressing on Wednesday that famine was “another killer” facing civilians, who report of horrifying conditions in the coastal area.

“The 2.1 million people trapped in the war zone that is Gaza are facing yet another killer on top of bombs and bullets: starvation,” Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in Geneva.

“We are witnessing a daily surge in malnutrition-related death,” he added.

“Since July 17, severe acute malnutrition centres are full without sufficient supplies for emergency feeding,” the WHO chief said, adding that the agency had documented the deaths of 21 children under the age of 5 due to malnutrition this year so far.

According to the World Food Programme, “nearly one person in three is not eating for days” in Gaza.

Aid groups demand access to Gaza

More than 100 aid and human rights organizations issued a joint appeal on Wednesday calling for access to starving people in the Gaza Strip.

“Just outside Gaza, in warehouses – and even within Gaza itself – tons of food, clean water, medical supplies, shelter items and fuel sit untouched with humanitarian organisations blocked from accessing or delivering them,” the 109 groups, which include Doctors Without Borders, Amnesty International and Save the Children, write.

“The Government of Israel’s restrictions, delays, and fragmentation under its total siege have created chaos, starvation, and death,” they say.

“The starvation of civilians as a method of warfare is a war crime,” they warn. Israel has so far not commented on the appeal.

Israel rejects accusations of famine

The Times of Israel recently quoted a senior Israeli security official as saying that the military was not aware of “famine” in Gaza. However, he conceded that measures were needed to stabilize the humanitarian situation in the sealed-off coastal enclave.

An Israeli government spokesman admitted on Wednesday that there is indeed hunger in the Gaza Strip, but stressed that this was not Israel’s fault.

Instead, he blamed Palestinian extremist group Hamas, accusing it of trying to prevent the distribution of aid to the population and hijacking aid lorries and selling them on to traders at horrendous prices to pay their fighters.

He also accused the UN of failing to pick up up aid lorries that are already inside the Gaza Strip and taking them to the people.

The UN has rejected such claims, noting that its aid organizations rarely receive permission for aid lorries to enter the strip.

More than 1,600 lorries carrying UN aid were authorized to enter Gaza between mid-May to mid-July, which amounts to less than 30 lorries per day.

Meanwhile, more than 600 to 650 trucks per day are needed to meet the civilian population’s most basic needs, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

According to an Israeli government spokesman, more than 4,400 lorries carrying aid entered the Gaza Strip between July 19 and 22.

Ten people died of hunger in the past 24 hours, according to the local health authority in Gaza, with a total of 111 Palestinians having died due to the lack of food so far. The information cannot be independently verified.

The United Nations has fixed guidelines to identify famine, which is only declared when at least 2% per 10,000 people “die daily of starvation, disease and malnutrition;” when at least 20% of households “face extreme food shortages”; and when at least 30% of children “suffer from acute malnutrition.”

The UN has cautioned that it is difficult to assess these criteria in the Gaza Strip in view of ongoing Israeli attacks and the displacement of the population.

According to the Times of Israel, thousands protested against the Gaza war in Tel Aviv during on Tuesday evening. Demonstrators also held up photos of children from the Gaza Strip who are said to have died as a result of starvation.

Participants in the march also carried sacks of flour to draw attention to the hardship in the Gaza Strip.