Malnutrition in Gaza City Reaches Crisis Levels, UN Warns

A dire situation is unfolding in Gaza City, where one in five children is malnourished, according to the UN's Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA).

Cases are increasing daily, with the agency's Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini describing the situation as catastrophic. "People in Gaza are neither dead nor alive, they are walking corpses," a colleague told him. The crisis has sparked warnings of mass starvation, with over 100 aid organisations and human rights groups pressing for action

Israel, which controls the entry of all supplies into Gaza, says there is no siege and blames Hamas for any cases of malnutrition.

The UN, however, has warned that the level of aid getting into Gaza is "a trickle" and the hunger crisis in the territory "has never been so dire".

In his statement on Thursday, Lazzarini said "more than 100 people, the vast majority of them children, have reportedly died of hunger".

Israel stopped aid deliveries to Gaza in early March following a two-month ceasefire. The blockade was partially eased after nearly two months, but food, fuel and medicine shortages worsened.

Israel, with the US, established a new aid system run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF). 

According to the UN human rights office, more than 1,000 Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli military while trying to get food aid over the past two months.

It says at least 766 of them have been killed in the vicinity of one of the GHF's four distribution centres, which are operated by US private security contractors and are located inside Israeli military zones.

Another 288 people have been reported killed near UN and other aid convoys.

Israel has accused Hamas of instigating the chaos near the aid sites. It says its troops have only fired warning shots and that they do not intentionally shoot civilians.

Source:Lead News Online/BBC News