A quarter of Gaza’s population is one step from famine and aid trucks are looted, UN says

UNITED NATIONS — At least a quarter of Gaza’s population – 576,000 people – is one step away from famine and almost the entire population is in desperate need of food, leading to some aid trucks being shot at, looted and overwhelmed by hungry people, top Gaza officials said UN Tuesday.

Officials from the UN humanitarian agency and the UN food and agriculture agencies painted a bleak picture of all 2.3 million people in Gaza facing crisis levels of food insecurity or worse, and of the breakdown of civil order , especially in the north, where food and other humanitarian supplies are scarce. scarce.

And as grim as the picture is today, UN Humanitarian Coordinator Ramesh Ramasingham told the UN Security Council that “there is every possibility for further deterioration.”

He said that in addition to a quarter of Gaza’s population being close to famine, 1 in 6 children under the age of two in northern Gaza suffer from “acute malnutrition and exhaustion”, causing the body to lose weight.

Carl Skau, deputy director of the World Food Programme, said this was “the worst level of child malnutrition anywhere in the world”. And he warned that “if nothing changes, a famine is looming in northern Gaza” – the original target of Israel’s military offensive after Hamas’s surprise attack in southern Israel on October 7, which killed around 1,200 people and left around 250 people were taken. captured.

In the latest example of the breakdown of civil order, Skau said the WFP resumed deliveries to northern Gaza for the first time in three weeks on February 18 and hoped to send 10 trucks a day for seven days to meet immediate food needs and in some cases foreseeable. reassurance for people that sufficient food would be available.

But on both February 18 and 19, he said, WFP convoys faced delays at checkpoints, gunfire and other violence, and the looting of food.

“At their destination they were overwhelmed by desperately hungry people,” he said.

Skau said: “The breakdown of civil order, driven by sheer desperation, is preventing the safe distribution of aid – and we have a duty to protect our personnel.”

As a result, he said, WFP has suspended aid deliveries to the north until conditions are met to ensure the safety of staff and people receiving aid.

Maurizio Martina, deputy director general of the Food and Agriculture Organization, described the dire condition of agricultural land, greenhouses, bakeries and irrigation systems that are essential for the production, processing and distribution of food.

Since October 9 – two days after the Hamas attacks – “Israel’s government’s reinforced blockade has included halting or restricting supplies of food, electricity and fuel, as well as commercial goods,” he said.

This has affected the entire food supply chain in several ways, Martina said.

For example, he said, severe restrictions on fuel transportation are crippling water supplies and the functioning of desalination plants, with water supplies at just 7% of pre-October levels. Fuel shortages have also crippled the production and delivery of food and electricity, and severely hampered bakeries’ ability to produce bread, he said.

Martina said the collapse of agricultural production in the north is already underway and will be completed by May in the most likely scenario. And as of February 15, it was estimated that more than 46% of all agricultural land in Gaza had been damaged, he said.

The FAO official presented more alarming figures about the Israeli offensive: a large number of animal enclosures and sheep and dairy farms have been destroyed, more than a quarter of wells destroyed and 339 hectares of greenhouses destroyed. And he said the war has also had a severe impact on olive and citrus crops, a major Palestinian money-earner.

As for animals, Martina says, many farmers are reporting significant losses, all poultry has likely been slaughtered and as many as 65% of calves and 70% of beef cattle are believed to have died.

Israel’s deputy U.N. ambassador, Brett Miller, told the council that as the country battles Hamas, the country is “doing everything it can to take care of its citizens,” and is continuously working to ensure access to humanitarian aid from numerous countries and UN agencies.

Since the October 7 attacks, he said, Israel has facilitated the delivery of 254,000 tons of humanitarian aid, including 165,000 tons of food. “There is absolutely no limit – and I repeat: there is no limit – on the amount of humanitarian aid that can be sent to the civilian population of Gaza,” he said.

Miller countered that twenty bakeries in Gaza produce more than two million pita breads a day.

He accused the UN of refusing to provide aid to northern Gaza, and some UN officials of trying to shift the blame to Israel.

In recent days, Miller said, 508 trucks were waiting to enter Gaza with Israeli permission. “So where is the UN and its aid agencies? How can Israel be slanderously held responsible for a situation that is clearly the UN’s fault?” he asked.

UN Humanitarian Coordinator Ramasingham, WFP’s Skau and FAO’s Martina all had a similar response: the first step to eliminating the threat of famine is a ceasefire to allow humanitarian workers to enter Gaza.

“If nothing is done, we fear that widespread famine in Gaza is almost inevitable,” Ramasingham said, and the Palestinian death toll that has reached nearly 30,000 “will leave many more victims.” That figure from Gaza’s health ministry does not distinguish between civilians and fighters, although the UN says the majority are women and children.