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Tag: starvation

  • ‘Complete Madness’: Israel Blocks Food Aid as More Gaza Children Starve to Death

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    Original article by BRETT WILKINS republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

    Relatives of Yazan al-Kafarneh and other Palestinians pray and mourn the death of the 10-year-old Gaza boy from severe malnutrition in Rafah on March 4, 2024. (Photo: Rabie Abu Noqaira/Anadolu via Getty Images)

    “The starvation of children is a hallmark of genocide and a deliberate political choice by Israel, backed by the Biden administration,” said one humanitarian coordinator.

    Gaza health officials said Thursday that the number of Palestinian children who have died from extreme malnutrition and dehydration amid Israel’s U.S.-backed genocide on the besieged strip has risen to at least 17, while one humanitarian group condemned the Israeli government for blocking lifesaving food and other aid from reaching starving people.

    According to the Gaza Health Ministry, 21 people in Gaza ranging from 1 day to 72 years old have died from malnutrition and dehydration. However, the humanitarian group Defense for Children International – Palestine (DCIP) warned that “the true death toll due to starvation is feared to be much higher as many Palestinians, particularly in northern Gaza, face famine and are almost entirely cut off from the limited humanitarian aid entering Gaza through the southern Rafah crossing.”

    “It is unthinkable that in 2024, in a world that produces more than enough food for all people, that Palestinian children are starving to death.”

    That’s because Israel Defense Forces (IDF) troops and civilians are blocking or severely restricting the flow of aid into Gaza. Soldiers stand by while extremist Israeli civilians set up roadblocks and encampments—one replete with a children’s bouncy castle—at border crossings. Israeli forces have repeatedly opened fire on aid convoys and crowds of people waiting for food deliveries, including in the February 29 Flour Massacre, in which more than 800 people were killed or wounded. Israeli civilians attempting to deliver aid to Gaza—including members of the Jewish-Arab solidarity group Standing Together—have been blocked by IDF troops.

    “It is unthinkable that in 2024, in a world that produces more than enough food for all people, that Palestinian children are starving to death,” said DCIP accountability program director Ayed Abu Eqtaish. “The starvation of children is a hallmark of genocide and a deliberate political choice by Israel, backed by the Biden administration.”

    “It is complete madness that Israeli authorities continue to prohibit and restrict food and other lifesaving supplies to a starving population while the international community stands by,” Abu Eqtaish added.

    DCIP noted that “Yazan Kafarneh, a 10-year-old Palestinian boy with cerebral palsy, died on March 4 of malnutrition and lack of healthcare.”

    “Young children, people with disabilities, pregnant women, and the elderly are particularly vulnerable to the impacts of malnutrition and dehydration,” DCIP warned.

    Gaza Health Ministry spokesperson Ashraf al-Qudra said Thursday that around 60,000 pregnant women in Gaza are suffering from dehydration, malnutrition, and lack of adequate medical care. Malnourished pregnant mothers can’t feed their fetuses; Gaza’s youngest starvation fatality was reportedly just 1 day old.

    United Nations, Palestinian, and humanitarian officials have called Israel’s deliberate starvation of Palestinians a key component of the genocide in Gaza, while limited aid airdrops by Jordan and the United States have been described as woefully inadequate and a “theater of cruelty.”

    More than 13,400 children and nearly 9,000 women are among the more than 30,800 Palestinians killed by Israeli forces in Gaza since the October 7 attacks, according to Palestinian and U.N. officials.

    In January, the International Court of Justice in The Hague found that Israel is “plausibly” committing genocide in Gaza and ordered the country’s government to prevent genocidal acts. South Africa, which is leading the ICJ case, says Israel is violating the court’s order, and on Wednesday asked the tribunal to order additional emergency measures to protect Gazans.

    In its plea, South Africa noted that when the ICJ declined to order requested emergency measures during the 1990s Balkan wars, “approximately 7,336 Bosnians in the so-called ‘safe area’ of Srebrenica had been slaughtered in what this court retrospectively determined to have been a genocide.”

    No famine has yet been declared in Gaza. However, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification initiative has launched a review of the Gaza crisis. ICP said in December that more than 90% of Gaza’s population was experiencing severe food insecurity or worse. That was before children started dying of starvation.

    Original article by BRETT WILKINS republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

  • Bullets Found at Gaza Flour Massacre Site Belie Israel’s ‘Stampede’ Claim

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    Original article by BRETT WILKINS republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

    Injured Palestinians receive medical treatment in al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City after Israeli forces open fire on starving people waiting for humanitarian aid trucks on February 29, 2024.  (Photo: Dawoud Abo Alkas/Anadolu via Getty Images

    A preliminary investigation by Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor affirmed that bullets that killed and wounded hundreds of Palestinians waiting for food aid are the same type fired by Israeli troops’ guns.

    Bullet wounds caused by the same type of large-caliber ammunition used in several Israel Defense Forces rifles and machine guns undercut Israeli officials’ dubious claim that most victims of last week’s “Flour Massacre” near Gaza City died in a stampede, one human rights monitor said Wednesday.

    Gaza officials said at least 118 Palestinians were killed and 760 others injured when Israeli troops shot and shelled a large crowd of starving people waiting for food distribution in the al-Nabulsi Roundabout area south of Gaza City on February 29. Israeli officials said many or most of the victims were trampled as the large crowd of people starving due to Israel’s siege and blockade of Gaza desperately rushed aid trucks.

    However, Dr. Mohammed Salha, the acting director of Al-Awda Hospital, told reporters last Friday that more than 80% of Flour Massacre victims treated at the facility suffered gunshot wounds. A United Nations team that visited al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City found “a large number of gunshot wounds” among the 200 or so patients being treated there.

    On Wednesday, the Geneva-based Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor, which is investigating the massacre, said that many victims suffered injuries from 5.56×45 mm NATO bullets, which are used in various guns carried by Israel Defense Forces (IDF) troops including M4 and Tavor assault rifles and IWI Negev light machine guns.

    “A sample of 200 dead and injured victims revealed that they were indeed hit by this type of bullet, and that the bullets were discovered and examined at the massacre site along with shrapnel found in the bodies of the wounded and dead,” the group said.

    Israel imports some of its 5.56 mm rounds from the United Kingdom, where Palestine advocates are calling for an investigation and the suspension of arms exports to the country.

    Numerous Flour Massacre survivors have described how Israeli troops opened fire on them while they attempted to secure food for their starving families.

    “We had been waiting for hours when we finally spotted the trucks. At that very moment, the Israeli occupation opened fire at us with gunfire and artillery shelling,” Hajj Mahmoud Daghmash toldThe Palestine Chronicle earlier this week. “Fear filled all our hearts, and people started running everywhere. We didn’t know where to hide. The screams of the wounded, women, and children were heard everywhere.”

    “The occupation killed us twice,” Daghmas added. “Once when it shelled our homes, and then again by starving us.”

    A group of U.N. special rapporteurs on Tuesday condemned the massacre and Israel’s policy of deliberately starving Gazans to death and attacking humanitarian aid and those delivering and receiving it.

    “Israel has been intentionally starving the Palestinian people in Gaza since October 8. Now it is targeting civilians seeking humanitarian aid and humanitarian convoys,” the U.N. experts said. “Israel must end its campaign of starvation and targeting of civilians.”

    On January 26, the International Court of Justice in The Hague found that Israel is “plausibly” committing genocide in Gaza and ordered the Israeli government to prevent genocidal acts. However, the U.N. experts asserted that “Israel is not respecting its international legal obligations, is not complying with the provisional measures of the International Court of Justice, and is committing atrocity crimes.”

    “Israel systematically denies and restricts the entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza by intercepting deliveries at checkpoints, bombing humanitarian convoys, and shooting at civilians seeking humanitarian assistance,” they said.

    IDF troops have also stood by as extremist Israeli civilians block roads at border crossings to prevent aid from entering Gaza. At one encampment, organizers erected a children’s bouncy castle and served cotton candy, popcorn, and slushies.

    Starvation and dehydration deaths have added a ghastly new dimension to a war in which at least 30,717 Palestinians—mostly women and children—have been killed and more than 72,000 others maimed by Israeli bombs and bullets, according to Gaza officials and international human rights groups.

    “Fifteen children have already died of malnutrition at Kamal Adwan Hospital in Gaza City, and there are fears that the figures could be higher in other hospitals,” the U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights said on Tuesday. “As the risk of famine continues to rise, all children under five—335,000—are at high risk of severe malnutrition, with serious negative impact on their development and their right to health. At least 90% of children under five are affected by one or more infectious diseases, and 70% have diarrhea.”

    It’s not just small children anymore. The Gaza Health Ministry said Wednesday that a 15-year-old died at al-Shifa Hospital and a 72-year-old man died at Kamal Adwan Hospital from malnutrition and dehydration.

    “Famine in northern Gaza has reached fatal levels, especially for children, pregnant women, and patients with chronic diseases,” ministry spokesperson Ashraf al-Qudra said. “Thousands of people are at risk of dying of starvation.”

    Israeli assaults on humanitarian aid convoys and starving Palestinians have continued, including a Sunday attack that killed and wounded scores of people at the Kuwait Roundabout south of Gaza City.

    Airdrops of food and humanitarian aid by Jordan and the United States—which also supplies Israel with the bombs being dropped on Gazans—have been decried as wholly insufficient to address the crisis.

    “I don’t think the airdropping of food in the Gaza Strip should be the answer today,” Philippe Lazzarini, who heads the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, said late last week. “The real answer is: Open the crossing and bring convoys and bring meaningful assistance into the Gaza Strip.”

    Original article by BRETT WILKINS republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

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    Bullets Found at Gaza Flour Massacre Site Belie Israel’s ‘Stampede’ Claim

  • ‘The Child Deaths We Feared Are Here,’ Says UNICEF

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    Original article by JAKE JOHNSON republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

    A Palestinian child receives treatment at a private children’s hospital in Rafah that specializes in providing care to children suffering from malnutrition.
     (Photo: Mohammed Talatene/Picture Alliance via Getty Images)

    The United Nations Children’s Fund said at least 10 kids in a northern Gaza hospital have died of malnutrition and dehydration—and many more are “fighting for their lives.”

    The United Nations Children’s Fund said Sunday that at least 10 children have reportedly died of starvation and dehydration at a hospital in northern Gaza as Israeli forces continue to obstruct and attack aid convoys, fueling desperation across the territory.

    Adele Khodr, UNICEF’s regional director for the Middle East and North Africa, said malnutrition is ravaging the Gaza Strip and warned that child deaths “are likely to rapidly increase” unless Israel ends its military assault and allows humanitarian aid to flow unimpeded.

    “The child deaths we feared are here,” said Khodr. “At least ten children have reportedly died because of dehydration and malnutrition in Kamal Adwan Hospital in the northern Gaza Strip in recent days. There are likely more children fighting for their lives somewhere in one of Gaza’s few remaining hospitals, and likely even more children in the north unable to obtain care at all.”

    “These tragic and horrific deaths are man-made, predictable, and entirely preventable,” Khodr added.

    Nearly half of the more than 30,000 people killed by U.S.-backed Israeli forces in Gaza since October have been children, and humanitarian officials have said disease and famine could soon become bigger killers than Israel’s bombs and bullets. United Nations experts and human rights groups have accused the Israeli government of using starvation as a weapon of war, intentionally depriving Gazans of food and other necessities.

    A group of U.N. officials warned last month that an “explosion in preventable child deaths” was looming.

    “The sense of helplessness and despair among parents and doctors in realizing that lifesaving aid, just a few kilometers away, is being kept out of reach, must be as unbearable, but worse still are the anguished cries of those babies slowly perishing under the world’s gaze,” Khodr said Sunday. “The lives of thousands more babies and children depend on urgent action being taken now.”

    Agnes Callamard, secretary-general of Amnesty International, said that “these deaths are unlawful, the result of acts by Israel authorities which engineered famine.”

    “They knew the likely outcome of their actions but persisted. Over weeks and months,” Callamard added. “And all states that cut UNRWA funding, sold weapons, and supported Israel bear responsibility too.”

    While virtually all of Gaza’s population is in need of food, conditions are particularly dire in the northern part of the territory. Carl Skau, deputy executive director of the World Food Program, told members of the U.N. Security Council last week that “if nothing changes, a famine is imminent in northern Gaza.”

    With aid deliveries plummeting due to Israel’s obstruction, families have been forced to eat grass, leaves, animal feed, and scraps left behind by rats. On Saturday, the U.S. airdropped 38,000 meals into Gaza—a move that critics said would do little to slow the rapid spread of hunger across the Palestinian territory.

    Melanie Ward, CEO of Medical Aid for Palestinians, described conditions in Gaza as “the fastest decline in a population’s nutrition status ever recorded.”

    “That means children are being starved at the fastest rate the world has ever seen,” Ward said in an appearance on CNN. “We could save them all. But we’re not being able to.”

    This story has been updated to include comment from Agnes Callamard of Amnesty International.

    Original article by JAKE JOHNSON republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

  • ‘Horror Is Growing By the Minute,’ Says Rights Group, as Israel Starves Gaza

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    Original article by JULIA CONLEY republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

    Children wait for food relief in the southern Gaza Strip city of Rafah on December 31, 2023. (Photo: Rizek Abdeljawad/Xinhua via Getty Images)

    “If current conditions persist,” said Israeli group B’Tselem, “there is significant risk that famine will be declared throughout the entire Gaza Strip within six months.”

    The Israeli government “can, if it chooses to,” save more than 2 million people who are starving in Gaza by ending its blockade on aid, an Israel-based human rights group emphasized in a report on Monday, condemning the country for continuing to allow just a fraction of the food needed in the enclave through border crossings as it relentlessly bombs civilian targets.

    “Everyone in Gaza is going hungry,” said B’Tselem in the dispatch, bluntly titled, “Israel Is Starving Gaza.”

    The organization pointed to a recent analysis by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification Famine Review Committee from late last month, which found that about 93% of Gaza’s over 2 million people were suffering from “acute food insecurity” at Phase 3, while more than 15%—378,000 people—were already at the most dire classification, Phase 5, with “extreme food shortages, hunger, and exhaustion.”

    By February 7, the entire population of Gaza is expected to reach Phase 3, and “if current conditions persist,” said B’Tselem, “there is significant risk that famine will be declared throughout the entire Gaza Strip within six months.”

    “Such a declaration is made when 20% of households read Phase 5, when 30% of children suffer from extreme malnutrition, and when two adults or four children out of 10,000 die of hunger every day,” said the group.

    Before Israel began its U.S.-backed bombardment of Gaza in retaliation for Hamas’ October 7 attack, about 80% of Gaza residents relied on humanitarian aid to survive.

    Israel’s destruction of cultivated fields, bakeries, food warehouses, and factories has meant that residents now wholly depend on food supplies from outside Gaza.

    That aid is still available, B’Tselem stressed, but cannot reach people because “Israel is deliberately denying the entry of enough food to meet the population’s needs.”

    About 500 aid trucks entered Gaza daily before the assault began, but only about 120 trucks are allowed through just two crossings—Rafah and Kerem Shalom—on a daily basis.

    The Rafah crossing is a designed for passenger vehicles rather than “massive commercial transports,” and the recent opening of the Kerem Shalom crossing was “merely a token addition that has failed to alleviate the hardship,” said B’Tselem.

    “The little food that does get in is very difficult to distribute due to constant bombings, destroyed roads, frequent communications blackouts, and shelters overflowing with hundreds of thousands of [internally displaced people] crowding into smaller and smaller areas,” said the group.

    Israel’s continued blockade has resulted in “children begging for food, people waiting in long lines for paltry handouts, and hungry residents charging at aid trucks,” B’Tselem added. “The horror is growing by the minute, and the danger of famine is real.”

    Martin Griffiths, undersecretary-general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator at the United Nations, said late last week that Israel’s air and ground assault on Gaza has rendered the enclave “uninhabitable.”

    “A public health disaster is unfolding,” said Griffiths. “Infectious diseases are spreading in overcrowded shelters as sewers spill over. Some 180 Palestinian women are giving birth daily amidst this chaos. People are facing the highest levels of food insecurity ever recorded. Famine is around the corner.”

    “For children in particular, the past 12 weeks have been traumatic: No food. No water. No school,” he added. “Nothing but the terrifying sounds of war, day in and day out.”

    Last month, Human Rights Watch accused Israel of using starvation as a “method of warfare”—a war crime according to international humanitarian law.

    “Changing this policy is not just a moral obligation,” said B’Tselem. “Allowing food into the Gaza Strip is not an act of kindness but a positive obligation under international humanitarian law: Starvation as a method of warfare is prohibited, and when a civilian population lacks what it needs to survive, parties to the conflict have a positive obligation to allow rapid and unimpeded passage of humanitarian aid—including food.”

    “These two rules are considered customary law,” added the group, “and violating them constitutes a war crime under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.”

    Original article by JULIA CONLEY republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

  • Israel Is Starving Gaza Civilians as ‘Method of Warfare’: Human Rights Watch

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    Original article by JULIA CONLEY republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 

    A view of empty shelves are seen at a supermarket amidst Israel’s bombardments as Palestinians have trouble finding necessary food in Khan Yunis, Gaza on November 11, 2023.  (Photo: Mustafa Hassona/Anadolu via Getty Images)

    “It’s critical to understand this is not simply a byproduct of the conflict, an unfortunate result of a terrible situation,” said one campaigner. “It is Israeli government policy.”

    From bombing food production hubs and systematically razing crop fields to halting aid deliveries, Israel is waging a multi-pronged effort to starve the people of Gaza amid the Israel Defense Forces’ bombardment of the enclave, Human Rights Watch said in a report Monday—with evidence drawn from the Israeli government’s own statements as well as survivors’ accounts.

    The group demanded that countries such as the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, and others that have provided Israel with military aid and other support since the country began its latest escalation against Gaza in October speak out against the use of starvation as a weapon of warfare—a war crime under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.

    “For over two months, Israel has been depriving Gaza’s population of food and water, a policy spurred on or endorsed by high-ranking Israeli officials and reflecting an intent to starve civilians as a method of warfare,” said Omar Shakir, Israel and Palestine director at Human Rights Watch (HRW). “World leaders should be speaking out against this abhorrent war crime, which has devastating effects on Gaza’s population.”

    HRW pointed to satellite imagery it has collected in northern Gaza since the IDF began its air and ground assault in retaliation for an attack by Hamas on southern Israel on October 7.

    The images have shown orchards, greenhouses, and farmland that have been razed over the last two months, “apparently by Israeli forces, compounding concerns of dire food insecurity.”

    Only sand and dirt have been left behind where farmers in northeastern Gaza grew citrus, potatoes, dragon fruit, and prickly pear since Israeli forces took control of the area in mid-November and “systematically razed” the fields, said the group.

    Palestinians in Gaza, home to about 2.3 million people, have lost the ability to grow their own food as Israel has refused to allow food, water, and fuel deliveries into the enclave, leaving bakeries and grocery store shelves empty.

    Before the Israeli bombardment began, about 500 aid trucks filled with food and other goods entered Gaza on a daily basis to provide sustenance amid Israel’s unlawful occupation and its land, air, and sea blockade that began 16 years ago. Israel has allowed only 100 aid trucks to cross through Egypt’s Rafah crossing since October 7. The U.N. humanitarian coordinator for the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Lynn Hastings, said earlier this month that fuel deliveries—needed for farming, cooking, water desalination, healthcare operations, and other necessities—have been “utterly insufficient.”

    Prior to the current escalation, about half of Gaza’s population was facing acute food insecurity and 80% were reliant on humanitarian aid.

    The World Food Program (WFP) at the U.N. said earlier this month that 9 in 10 households in northern Gaza and 2 in 3 homes in the south had been without food for at least one full day and night since Israel’s assault. It also warned that 38% of families who had been displaced from their homes in northern Gaza were experiencing “severe levels of hunger” and that the enclave faces a “high risk of famine.”

    “It’s critical to understand this is not simply a byproduct of the conflict, an unfortunate result of a terrible situation. It is Israeli government policy,” said Andrew Stroehlein, European media and editorial director for HRW.

    In addition to the halting of aid and the destruction of Gaza’s agricultural sector, the last operational wheat mill was bombed on November 15 ensureing “that locally produced flour will be unavailable in Gaza for the foreseeable future,” said HRW.

    The group interviewed 11 civilians who described their struggles with finding sufficient food in recent weeks.

    A man identified as Taher said that after his family fled south to Gaza City in November, they resorted to eating “just once a day to survive.”

    “The city was out of everything, of food and water,” he told HRW. “If you find canned food, the prices were so high… We were running out of money. We decided to just have the necessities, to have less of everything.”

    Majed, who left his home in the north after his house was bombed, killing his six-year-old son, said he, his wife, and their four surviving children had no way of making bread for more than a month when they temporarily stayed in Gaza City.

    “In those 33 days we didn’t have bread because there was no flour,” he said. “There was no water—we were buying water, sometimes for $10 a cup. It wasn’t always drinkable. Sometimes, [the water we drank] was from the bathroom and sometimes from the sea. The markets around the area were empty. There wasn’t even canned food.”

    HRW noted that the Israeli government itself has made numerous statements in recent weeks pointing to the deliberate destruction of Gaza’s food access and the starvation of civilians.

    Defense Minister Yoav Gallant infamously called Palestinians in Gaza “human animals” when he announced the “complete siege” and cutting off of aid into the enclave on October 9.

    “No electricity, no food, no water, no fuel—everything is closed,” Gallant said.

    Col. Yogev Bar-Shesht, deputy head of the Civil Administration, said in an interview that eliminating Palestinians’ ability to grow food is a deliberate tactic.

    “Whoever returns here, if they return here after, will find scorched earth,” he said. “No houses, no agriculture, no nothing. They have no future.”

    HRW’s report came as the death toll in Gaza hit at least 19,453, with more than 50,800 injured and thousands believed to be buried underneath rubble.

    Article 54(1) of the First Additional Protocol to the Geneva Conventions and Article 14 of the Second Additional Protocol both prohibit starvation of civilians as a method of warfare.

    “Although Israel is not a party to Protocols I or II, the prohibition is recognized as reflective of customary international humanitarian law in both international and noninternational armed conflicts,” said HRW.

    The worsening humanitarian catastrophe, and Israel’s refusal to operate within the bounds of international law, “calls for an urgent and effective response from the international community,” said Shakir.

    “The Israeli government is compounding its collective punishment of Palestinian civilians and the blocking of humanitarian aid,” he said, “by its cruel use of starvation as a weapon of war.”

    Original article by JULIA CONLEY republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).