Gaza is the “hungriest place on Earth,” according to the UN, as Israel continues to impede humanitarian aid from reaching the Strip, where the entire Palestinian population is famine-stricken, and Israeli troops relentlessly bomb the besieged enclave.
The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), a spokesperson, reported on Friday that “catastrophic hunger” is currently affecting 2.3 million people in Gaza.
Laerk remarked that “Gaza” has a “drip-feeding system” and that the “limited number of truckloads coming in [is] drip-feeding food.”
According to him, “The aid operation that we have ready to roll is being put in a functioning straitjacket, making it one of the most obstructed aid operations in recent history and not just in the world today.”
The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a new, shadowy NGO supported by Israel and the United States, is in charge of what lack of aid is entering the region.
Sources at Gaza hospitals reported to Al Jazeera on Friday that 20 patients had been shot by Israeli soldiers as they fought a GHF aid distribution point to get food.
The third distribution site, which is situated close to Israel’s Netzarim Corridor bordering the territory, was established after two distribution points were established in Rafah, in the south of the country.
Around the clock, armed surveillance is carried out. “People are telling us that the GHF’s sites are a few meters from the Israeli military’s bases. According to Hani Mahmoud, a journalist for Al Jazeera from Gaza City, “they can see the tanks and they can see the armored vehicles.”
Earlier this week, ten people were killed while attempting to gain access to food distribution centers, with many of the victims seen being herded into cage-like lines in images. Palestinians must take the risk of Israeli fire and military fire if they try to aid their families in any way.
“There have also been reports of forced disappearances. Many families reported that many of their children, or at least one member of their families, vanished while trying to get food at the sites, Mahmoud said.
UN officials and the humanitarian community have publicly denounced the aid delivery plan, accusing it of supporting Israel’s war goals by forcibly displaced Palestinians under the guise of aid.
If Israel would grant access to aid and let the organizations with decades of experience manage the flow, critics claim that Gaza’s currently insufficient aid could be safely increased.
Doctors Without Borders Secretary-General Christopher Lockyear said, “Food is not being distributed where it’s needed most because this dangerous and reckless approach only targets areas where Israeli forces choose to amass civilians.” This means that the elderly and those with disabilities have essentially no chance of getting the food they so desperately need.
At least 20% of households in the region where there is a severe lack of food are declared famine. At famine-levels of deprivation, 30% of children experience acute malnutrition, and at least four out of every 10,000 children per day die from starvation or a malnutrition-linked disease. According to OCHA, Gaza is currently a country where at least one in five people are starving.
It’s “safe to say there is famine” in Gaza, according to UN special rapporteur on the right to food Michael Fakhri. According to Fakri, Israel is using aid “as bait to woo people out of the north and into militarized zones,” according to Fakiri.
When Israel imposed a total blockade on March 2, the humanitarian situation in Gaza had already become catastrophic. Israeli authorities announced they would allow the Strip’s population to receive only minimal food and medicine after growing international pressure. However, crucial supplies continue to go unreachable.
France’s threat of sanctions
Emmanuel Macron, the president of France, emphasized the condemnation of Israel on Friday. If the Israeli government doesn’t address the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, Paris may “agree sanctions.”
Macron said during a visit to Singapore on Friday that the international community must not remain passive while Gaza’s Palestinians are dealing with an “unfathomable” hunger crisis.
We will have to “harden our collective position” if there is no action in the coming hours and days in accordance with the humanitarian situation, he continued, suggesting that France might consider imposing sanctions on Israeli settlers.
As the ceasefire is not yet known, there are daily deaths of Palestinians.
At least 30 people have been killed in attacks in Khan Younis, northern Jabalia, and southern Deir el-Balah since Friday morning when they were attacked.
In addition to expanding its military presence on the ground, the Israeli army has issued new forced displacement orders for five northern Gazan towns. Nearly 200, 000 people have been displaced in Gaza in the last two weeks as a result of Israel’s displacement orders, according to a UN official.
Meanwhile, there were no realyy hopes for the elusive truce. Hamas announced on Friday that it is currently reviewing a new US ceasefire proposal that Israel claims has approved but which, in its current form, will only lead to “the continuation of killing and famine” in Gaza.
Israel “signed off” on the ceasefire proposal, according to White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt on Thursday, according to Steve Witkoff, the Trump administration’s Middle East envoy, who had given it to Hamas for consideration.
Trump asserted that he anticipates an announcement from his administration later on Friday, or perhaps tomorrow.
He told reporters from the Oval Office, “We have a chance of that.”
