The Israeli announcement comes as the 2 million residents of Gaza are on the brink of famine, with images of emaciated children drawing international outrage after they appeared in media outlets around the world.
Finding food has become more difficult and deadly for Palestinians since an American and Israeli-backed organization, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, took over the aid distribution process in late May. Hundreds of people have been killed or injured in recent weeks as they sought to obtain limited humanitarian aid, including 20 who were killed yesterday, according to a spokesperson for the Gaza Health Ministry.
The U.N. human rights office said yesterday that “nutrition partners report that acute malnutrition among children in Gaza has reached the highest levels recorded to date.”
Almost 12,000 children ages 6 months to almost 5 years old were identified as acutely malnourished, and of those over 2,500 suffered the most life-threatening form, it said.
Last week, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) said in an alert that the “worst-case scenario of famine is currently playing out in the Gaza Strip.”
The IPC reported that two of the three famine thresholds had been reached — plummeting food consumption and acute malnutrition — had been reached in Gaza.
“Famine has not been declared as the third criteria, deaths from malnutrition, cannot be demonstrated,” the U.N. said.
The World Food Programme said last week that the latest numbers confirmed that Gaza “faces the grave risk of famine.”
“This is not a future risk — it is a present catastrophe,” the WFP said.
