Famine in northern Gaza is imminent as more

than 1 million people face ‘catastrophic’ levels

of hunger, new report warns
Famine is imminent in northern Gaza where 70% of the population are already
suffering with catastrophic levels of hunger, a UN-backed report said Monday,
as the EU’s top diplomat accused Israel of using “starvation as a weapon of
war.”
All 2.2 million people in Gaza do not have enough food to eat, with half of the
population on the brink of starvation and famine projected to arrive in the north
“anytime between mid-March and May 2024,” according to the Integrated Food
Security Phase Classification (IPC).
Acute hunger and malnutrition have already “far exceeded” the threshold for
famine in northern Gaza and the IPC warns of a “major acceleration of death
and malnutrition.”
This is the “highest number of people facing catastrophic hunger ever
recorded… anywhere, anytime,” by the IPC, said United Nations Secretary-
General Antonio Guterres.
At least 25 people, including children and babies, have died from starvation and
dehydration in the north, according to the Ministry of Health in Gaza. People
have resorted to scavenging, eating grass and animal feed, and drinking
polluted water. Starving mothers are unable to produce enough milk to feed
their babies and parents beg for infant formula at overwhelmed health facilities,
parents and doctors told CNN.
The crisis has been described as “entirely man-made” and “preventable” due to
Israel’s throttling of aid and widespread destruction of Gaza. The report said
famine conditions will spread unless there is an “immediate cessation of
hostilities” and full aid access granted to the strip.
“People in Gaza are starving to death right now. The speed at which this man-
made hunger and malnutrition crisis has ripped through Gaza is terrifying,” said
World Food Programme Executive Director Cindy McCain.
“There is a very small window left to prevent an outright famine and to do that
we need immediate and full access to the north. If we wait until famine has been
declared, it’s too late. Thousands more will be dead.”
The European Union’s top diplomat Josep Borrell accused Israel of using
“starvation as a weapon of war,” saying the famine was “not a natural disaster”
but caused by Israel “preventing humanitarian support entering into Gaza.”
Hundreds of trucks were waiting at the border and being prevented entry into
Gaza by Israel, he said.
“The support is there waiting. Trucks are stopped, people are dying,” Borrell
said. Aid delivery by sea and air was only necessary because the “natural” way
of delivering aid by land was “artificially closed” by Israel, he added.
The World Food Programme estimates that at least 300 trucks are needed to
enter Gaza every day and distribute food to meet only the basic hunger needs.
The UN agency has only managed to take nine convoys into northern Gaza
since the start of the year, it said in a statement.
A ceasefire remains the only way for agencies such as the WFP to “roll out a
massive relief operation reaching all the communities in need,” it said.
Famine will spread, warning over Rafah offensive
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told CNN in an interview on
Sunday that his country’s policy is to let as much humanitarian aid into Gaza as
is necessary. But that claim has been disputed by aid agencies and even
contradicts his own statements.
“Our policy is to not have famine, but to be the entry of humanitarian support as
needed, and as much as is needed,” Netanyahu told CNN.
Aid workers and government officials say a pattern has emerged of Israeli
obstruction, where Israel’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the
Territories (COGAT), the agency that controls access to Gaza, has imposed
arbitrary and contradictory criteria on relief entering the enclave.
About 210,000 people in the northern Gaza governates are already thought to
be in Phase 5 of the IPC Food Insecurity Scale - known as the “Catastrophe
Phase.”
One in three children below the age of 2 are “acutely malnourished,” the report
said.
In the south, the governorates of Deir al-Balah, Khan Younis and Rafah are all
in a Phase 4 or the “Emergency Phase” and in the worst-case scenario face the
“risk of famine through July 2024,” according to the report.
“Between mid-March and mid-July, in the most likely scenario and under the
assumption of an escalation of the conflict including a ground offensive in Rafah,
half of the population of the Gaza Strip (1.11 million people) is expected to face
catastrophic conditions (IPC Phase 5),” the report warned.
Scarce supplies mean that “virtually all households are skipping meals every
day” and adults are going without so their children can eat, the report said. In
two-thirds of households in northern Gaza, people “went entire days and nights
without eating at least 10 times in the last 30 days,” the report found. “In the
southern governorates, this applies to one third of the households.”
Famine could be halted if aid organizations are allowed full access to Gaza to
bring food, water and other supplies to the civilian population, the report said.
For this to happen, a ceasefire is needed immediately, it said.
But Netanyahu has vowed to push ahead with a planned ground offensive in
Rafah, which has been under Israeli bombardment for weeks and where an
estimated 1.5 million Palestinians are now sheltering.
International alarm is mounting over the pending operation, with fears that
further escalation of violence will lead to more deaths and suffering, and
exacerbate the hunger crisis.
On Monday, US President Joe Biden voiced “deep concerns” over Rafah in a
phone call with Netanyahu, according to Biden’s top national security official.
National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said Biden sought to explain to
Netanyahu why the plan for Rafah could prove catastrophic for Palestinian
civilians and hamper the flow of humanitarian aid into Gaza.
The concerns fall within three areas: that civilians sheltering in Rafah have
nowhere safe to go; that Rafah is an entry point for critical humanitarian
assistance; and that neighboring Egypt has voiced serious concerns about a
potential military operation there, he said.
Sullivan said Israel has not presented a plan to the United States or the rest of
the world on protecting Palestinian civilians in Rafah.