The UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) has sounded a grave alarm regarding growing child malnutrition in Gaza City, citing one in five children as malnourished and over 100 people, mostly children, dying from hunger.
Because of severe food scarcity, UNRWA head Philippe Lazzarini said people are “walking corpses” and characterized the situation as catastrophic. Medical personnel are also falling from hunger, living on one meal, if any, per day.
Aid access remains carefully regulated notwithstanding Israel raising its whole blockade in May. Currently, only about 70 trucks are allowed each day—far short of the 500 to 600 daily UN claims that are required to satisfy humanitarian needs.
Including BBC, AFP, AP, and Reuters, international news outlets have also urged Israel to permit journalists in and out of Gaza free passage, warning that indigenous journalists run the risk of starvation themselves now.
Israel has resisted and said food is entering Gaza; spokesman David Mencer accuses Hamas of looting relief and generating the crisis. Hamas disputes those accusations.
UN officials caution that the humanitarian system is ready to fall apart.
The United States and Israel’s current assistance delivery organization, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, has been fiercely attacked by the United Kingdom and a number of other nations. According to critics, the strategy has not succeeded in protecting people and has instead caused fatal pandemonium, with Israeli military allegedly shooting at Palestinians attempting to get food close to distribution centers. More than 800 Palestinians have reportedly been slain in recent weeks while trying to get relief, with Israeli troops stationed close to these locations shooting the majority of the victims. There is still a severe lack of clean water, food, and medical care for 2.1 million people in Gaza, which has sparked international outrage.
In order to guarantee secure and unhindered access to humanitarian supplies, rights organizations and relief organizations have called the approach dangerously ineffective and demanded an immediate reform.
