A worst-case scenario of famine is unfolding in Gaza and immediate action is needed to avoid widespread death, a hunger monitor warned yesterday, as the number of Palestinians reported killed in the conflict crossed the 60,000 threshold.
The alert by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) raised the prospect that the man-made starvation crisis could be formally classified as a famine, in the hope that this might raise the pressure on Israel to let in far more food.
Facing mounting international criticism over conditions in Gaza, Israel announced steps over the weekend to ease aid access. But the World Food Programme (WFP) said yesterday it was not getting the permissions it needed to deliver enough aid since Israel began humanitarian pauses on Sunday.
“Mounting evidence shows that widespread starvation, malnutrition, and disease are driving a rise in hunger-related deaths,” the IPC said, adding that “famine thresholds” have been reached for food consumption in most of the Gaza Strip.
It said it would quickly carry out the formal analysis that could allow it to classify Gaza as “in famine.”
For famine to be declared, at least 20 per cent of the population must be suffering extreme food shortages, with one in three children acutely malnourished and two people out of every 10,000 dying daily from starvation or from malnutrition and disease.
Gaza health authorities have been reporting more and more people dying from hunger-related causes. The total stands at 147, among them 88 children, most of whom died in the last few weeks.
Images of emaciated Palestinian children have shocked the world, with Israel’s strongest ally US President Donald Trump declaring that many people were starving. He promised to set up new “food centres.”
The death toll of 60,000 announced by Gaza health authorities yesterday dwarfs previous wars between Israel and Hamas since the group seized control of Gaza in 2007.
The previous most deadly was in 2014, when 2,100 Palestinians were killed in Gaza, mostly civilians, while Israel lost 67 soldiers and six civilians.
Israel launched the offensive in response to Hamas’ attacks on October 7, 2023, when fighters killed some 1,200 people and took another 251 hostage.
Thousands more bodies are believed to be buried under rubble in Gaza, meaning the death toll is likely to be significantly higher, Palestinian officials and rescue workers say.
Israeli air strikes overnight killed at least 30 Palestinians in Al Nuseirat camp in central Gaza, Gaza health authorities said. Doctors at Al Awda Hospital said at least 14 women and 12 children were among the dead.
The hospital also said that 13 people had been killed and dozens wounded by Israeli fire along the Salahudeen Road as they waited for aid trucks to roll into Gaza.
A total of 55 Palestinians were killed in attacks overnight, Gaza health authorities said.
Saar said 5,000 aid trucks had entered Gaza in the last two months, and that Israel would assist those wanting to conduct airdrops – a delivery method that aid groups say is ineffective and tokenistic.
Ross Smith, a senior regional programme adviser at the World Food Programme, told reporters in Geneva by video: “We’re getting approximately 50pc of what we’re requesting into Gaza since these humanitarian pauses started on Sunday.
“We are not going to be able to address the needs of the population unless we can move in the volume that we need.”
After an 11-week Israeli blockade, limited UN-led aid operations resumed on May 19 and a week later the obscure new US-based Gaza Humanitarian Foundation – backed by Israel and the US – began distributing food aid.
The rival efforts have sparked a war of words – pitting Israel, the US and the GHF against the UN, international aid groups and dozens of governments from around the world.
The IPC said 88pc of Gaza was now under evacuation orders or within militarised areas, and was critical of GHF efforts.
It said most of the GHF food items “require water and fuel to cook, which are largely unavailable.”
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