‘Gaza is the hungriest place on Earth’: UN’s stark warning as Israel accused of drip-feeding aid
Gaza is the “hungriest place on Earth” and facing catastrophe, the UN has warned, as aid continues to struggle to reach starving Palestinians.
The UN’s humanitarian office said Israel was allowing a “trickle” of food into the enclave when it should be a “flood”, with 300 aid trucks unable to offload due to operational bottlenecks.
It comes as hopes for a 60-day ceasefire and hostage exchange proposed by the Americans hang in the balance. Hamas said it was “reviewing” the Israel-backed plans but has already claimed the deal lacks a commitment to end the conflict.
Meanwhile, the crisis on the ground continues to mount, with Israel ordering the evacuation of the last functioning hospital in northern Gaza while at least 14 Palestinians were killed in Israeli airstrikes on Friday.
Last week, Israel partially lifted an 11-week blockade of aid into Gaza, allowing a limited amount of aid into the territory, through a new but heavily criticised system introduced by Benjamin Netanyahu’s government.
The UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs spokesperson Jens Laerke said aid deliveries were still severely restricted, as hunger and malnutrition spread among the increasingly desperate 2.3 million Palestinians living in Gaza.
“It is drip-feeding food into an area on the verge of catastrophic hunger,” he said in a press briefing in Geneva. “It’s not a flood.”
Mr Laerke called for immediate changes to how aid was being allowed into the enclave so food could be delivered “directly to families”, pointing out that almost no ready-to-eat food was entering.
“Gaza is the hungriest place on Earth,” he said. “It’s the only defined area, a country or defined territory within a country where you have the entire population at risk of famine, 100 per cent of the population at risk of famine.
“The aid operation that we have ready to roll is being put in an operational straitjacket that makes it one of the most obstructed aid operations, not only in the world today, but in the recent history of global humanitarian response anywhere.”
Médecins Sans Frontières secretary-general Christopher Lockyear agreed the new system was not working.
“The most vulnerable – especially the elderly and people with disabilities – have virtually no chance of accessing the food they desperately need,” he said. “The claim that this unprincipled, failing mechanism is necessary to prevent the diversion of aid is false.”
Israel’s foreign ministry rebuked criticism of the flow of aid, saying on Friday: “There is no humanitarian blockade. That is a blatant lie.”
The ministry said it was facilitating the entry of aid in two ways: first, by allowing nearly 900 trucks to enter Gaza this week.
