Since last month, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), a UN-backed global hunger-monitoring system, declared that parts of Gaza were experiencing a full-famine, over 83 people have died, according to a statement released on Tuesday.
Additionally, according to the Health Ministry, over 55, 000 pregnant and breastfeeding women and 43, 000 children under the age of five are all at risk of malnutrition. The highest rate in years was recorded in anaemia, which affected two-thirds of pregnant women, it added. The most vulnerable to malnutrition are mothers and newborns.
Since Israel’s genocidal war began on October 7, 2023, there have been 361 hunger-related deaths in the besieged enclave, including 130 children.
During the conflict, Israel has killed at least 63,557 people, and injured 160,660 in Gaza.
Nearly a quarter of the population of the Gaza Strip, or 514, 000 people, are experiencing famine, according to the IPC’s announcement on August 22. By the end of September, it anticipated a rise in the number to 641,000.
After more than 22 months of fighting, the IPC made its declaration following which Israeli forces have occupied the besieged Strip, targeted and killed Palestinians seeking food aid, and obliterated medical facilities, schools, infrastructure, and bakeries.
The global organization predicted that famine conditions would be present in Deir el-Balah in central Gaza and Khan Younis in the south by the end of this month, marking the first time the IPC has documented famine outside of Africa.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres described the famine as “man-made disaster, a moral indictment, and a failure of humanity itself” following the IPC’s declaration.
As an occupying force, Guterres claimed that Israel had “unequivocal obligations” under international law to ensure food and medical supplies entered Gaza.
Action has been demanded by humanitarian organizations. Israel, for its part, refuted the findings, claiming that despite the IPC’s overwhelming evidence, Gaza had no famine.
According to Al Jazeera’s Tareq Abu Azzoum, who arrived from Deir el-Balah at noon, at least 54 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza since dawn on Tuesday, including several aid seekers. As the Israeli army bombs and forcibly moves residents to the southern region of the enclave, Israeli attacks are now concentrated on Gaza City.
The brunt is said to be “civilians on the ground.” In Gaza City, according to Azzoum, there are still hundreds of thousands of families there. They stay in their homes and communities because they are aware that there are no safe places in central and southern Gaza and that they prefer to stay there.
One million Palestinians, or nearly half of Gaza’s population, once lived in Gaza City, which is now a landscape of rubble.
Leading international law experts made a landmark discovery when they officially stated that Israel’s war against Gaza complies with the legal definition of genocide.
Source: Aljazeera
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