Where humanity ends in Palestine, a writer offers his library in exchange for food
Because what place do books have in a land where access to food is now wielded like a weapon? 'I once plucked roses from language,' Hamad recalls in a short essay on LitHub. But even for a writer, books can qualify as a necessity only when the sharp edge of hunger is sheathed — not when there are mouths to feed, wounds to salve, bodies to count. Twenty-one months of conflict have made Gaza, as United Nations officials have reported, 'the hungriest place on Earth'. From rice to lentils to baby formula, even the most staple of foods have been made scarce by Israeli blockades and reports emerge every day of desperate, hungry people being crushed to death by others who are just as famished and just as desperate, begging for relief at aid hubs.
This is the double tragedy of Gaza where, for millennia, olive trees and poetry grew in equal profusion. Literature may be immortal, but for an entire population that faces starvation, books, too, have been reduced to mere possessions, emergency currency to be exchanged for food. The cultural devastation of Gaza since October 2023 is heartbreaking, with libraries, museums and ancient cultural sites destroyed by bombing. But as hunger stalks through the Strip, there will come a time when the world must reckon with a greater, incalculable loss.
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Time of India
12 hours ago
- Time of India
NGOs warn 'mass starvation' spreading across Gaza
GAZA: More than 100 aid organisations and human rights groups warned on Wednesday that " mass starvation " was spreading in Gaza , as the United States said its top envoy was heading to Europe for talks on a possible ceasefire and aid corridor. Israel is facing mounting international pressure over the catastrophic humanitarian situation in Gaza, where more than two million people are facing severe shortages of food and other essentials after 21 months of conflict. Explore courses from Top Institutes in Please select course: Select a Course Category Management Healthcare Project Management PGDM MCA Operations Management Design Thinking Data Analytics Degree MBA Cybersecurity Leadership Artificial Intelligence others healthcare Data Science Finance Technology Others Public Policy Digital Marketing Data Science Product Management CXO Skills you'll gain: Duration: 9 Months IIM Calcutta CERT-IIMC APSPM India Starts on undefined Get Details Skills you'll gain: Duration: 10 Months IIM Kozhikode CERT-IIMK GMPBE India Starts on undefined Get Details Skills you'll gain: Duration: 11 Months IIM Kozhikode CERT-IIMK General Management Programme India Starts on undefined Get Details But it denied blocking supplies, announcing that 950 trucks' worth of aid were in Gaza and waiting for international agencies to collect and distribute it. "We have not identified starvation at this current point in time but we understand that action is required to stabilise the humanitarian situation," an unnamed senior Israeli security official was quoted as saying by the Times of Israel. On the ground, the Israeli military said it was operating in Gaza City and the north, and had hit dozens of "terror targets" across the Palestinian territory. Live Events Gaza's civil defence agency told AFP that Israeli strikes killed 10 people overnight. The United Nations said on Tuesday that Israeli forces had killed more than 1,000 Palestinians trying to get food since the US- and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) started operations in late May -- effectively sidelining the longstanding UN-led system. A statement with 111 signatories, including Doctors Without Borders (MSF), Save the Children and Oxfam, warned that "our colleagues and those we serve are wasting away".
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First Post
15 hours ago
- First Post
Gaza has been starving for months. So why hasn't a famine been declared?
Nearly all the 2 million Palestinians in the Gaza strip depend on outside aid. Local food production was extremely limited prior the Israeli offensive. It has since been completely eradicated. The UN says Gaza's hunger crisis has reached 'new and astonishing levels of desperation'. So why hasn't a famine been declared? read more Palestinian people with empty bowls wait for food at a donation point in Rafah. The widespread hunger and malnutrition in Gaza is catastrophic, UN has said. (Photo: NPR) Gaza has been on the brink of famine for months. Palestinians are said to be starving. Israel in May relaxed an over two month blockade on the Gaza strip. However, aids groups say not enough food is getting through. They Palestinians are facing unimaginable levels of hunger. Meanwhile, Israeli forces have killed hundreds trying to get to aid sites and convoys – though the military denies this. So why hasn't a famine been declared? The crisis Nearly all the 2 million Palestinians in the Gaza strip depend on outside aid. Local food production was extremely limited prior the Israeli offensive. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD It has since been completely eradicated. The UN World Food Program says Gaza's hunger crisis has reached 'new and astonishing levels of desperation.' They say around 100,000 women and children are suffering from severe acute malnutrition. Around one-third of Gaza's population is spending days without eating, according to UN director for emergencies Ross Smith. On Tuesday alone over 100 people suffering hunger and malnutrition died – though the cause was not officially listed as such. Most of these were children. When is a famine declared? The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) is widely regarded as the leading international authority on food crises. The IPC was established during the Somalia famine in 2004. It comprises several UN agencies, aid groups, governments and other bodies. It says famine can appear in pockets — sometimes small ones — and a formal classification requires caution. The IPC has only declared famine on only a handful of occasions. This includes Somalia in 2011, and South Sudan in 2017 and 2020, and last year in parts of Sudan's western Darfur region. Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) has only declared famine on only a handful of occasions. Tens of thousands are believed to have died in Somalia and South Sudan. It classifies an area as being in famine when all three of these conditions are confirmed: STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD Twenty per cent of households have an extreme lack of food, or are essentially starving. At least 30 per cent of children six months to five years old suffer from acute malnutrition or wasting, meaning they're too thin for their height. At least two people or four children under five per 10,000 are dying daily due to starvation or the interaction of malnutrition and disease. Gaza, meanwhile, is an even bigger challenge for experts. This is because access to the strip is severely limited – making gathering reliable information nearly impossible. Governments usually declare famine Famine declarations usually are usually made by the governments themselves or the United Nations. While the IPC says it is the 'primary mechanism' used by the international community to conclude whether a famine is happening or projected, it typically doesn't make such a declaration itself. Often, UN officials together with governments will make a formal statement based on an analysis from the IPC. But the IPC says once a famine is declared it's already too late. While it can prevent further deaths, it means many people will have died by the time a famine is declared. Hunger as cause of death? Most cases of severe malnutrition in children arise through a combination of lack of nutrients along with an infection, leading to diarrhea and other symptoms that cause dehydration, said Alex de Waal, author of 'Mass Starvation: The History and Future of Famine' and executive director of the World Peace Foundation. 'There are no standard guidelines for physicians to classify cause of death as 'malnutrition' as opposed to infection,' he said. Palestinians gather to receive food from a charity kitchen, amid a hunger crisis, in Gaza City, July 22, 2025. File Image/Reuters When famine occurs, there are often relatively few deaths from hunger alone, with far more people dying from a combination of malnutrition, disease and other forms of deprivation. All of these count as excess deaths — separate from violence — that can be attributed to a food crisis or famine, he said. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD Reliable information is hard to find Israel's offensive has gutted Gaza's health system and displaced some 90 per cent of its population. With hospitals damaged and overwhelmed by war casualties, it can be difficult to screen people for malnutrition and collect precise data on deaths. 'Data and surveillance systems are incomplete and eroded,' said James Smith, an emergency doctor and lecturer in humanitarian policy at the University College London who spent more than two months in Gaza. 'Which means that all health indicators — and the death toll — are known to be an underestimation,' he said. 'Not a huge bank account' A declaration of famine should in theory galvanize the international community to rush food to those who need it. But with aid budgets already stretched, and war and politics throwing up obstacles, that doesn't always happen. 'There is not a big, huge bank account' to draw on, said OCHA's Laerke. 'The fundamental problem is that we build the fire engine as we respond.' Aid groups say plenty of food and other aid has been gathered on Gaza's borders, but Israel is allowing only a small amount to enter. Within Gaza, gunfire, chaos and looting have plagued the distribution of food. The Israeli military says it has facilitated the entry of some 4,500 aid trucks since mid-May. That's far below the 600 trucks a day that aid groups say are needed, and which entered during a six-week ceasefire earlier this year. An Israeli-backed American contractor is also distributing food. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD UN agencies say Israeli restrictions, and the breakdown of law and order, make it difficult to distribute the food that does come in. 'Only a massive scale-up in food aid distributions can stabilize this spiraling situation, calm anxieties and rebuild the trust within communities that more food is coming,' the World Food Program said over the weekend. 'An agreed ceasefire is long overdue.'
News18
3 days ago
- News18
Gazas children have missed 2 years of school. Truce wont undo damage
Khan Younis (Gaza Strip), Jul 21 (AP) Two years ago, Sarah Qanan was a star high school student preparing for final exams and dreaming of becoming a doctor. Today, the 18-year-old lives in a sweltering tent in the Gaza Strip and says she is just trying to stay alive. She's part of a generation of Palestinians from grade school through university who have had virtually no access to education in the territory since the war began in October 2023. Classes were suspended that month and schools were transformed into crowded shelters as hundreds of thousands fled their homes at the start of Israel's campaign of retaliation after Hamas Oct 7, 2023, attack. The closure of schools has removed a key social outlet for young people as they grapple with war, hunger and displacement. For younger children, it has meant missing out on basic skills like reading and simple arithmetic. For older students, advanced subjects, graduation exams and college applications have all been put on hold. Even if negotiations lead to another ceasefire, it's unclear when anything in Gaza will be rebuilt. Vast areas have been completely destroyed, and the U.N. children's agency estimates that nearly 90% of schools will need substantial reconstruction before they can function again. Like many in Gaza, Qanan's family has been displaced multiple times and is now living in a tent. When an Israeli airstrike destroyed their home in early 2024, she dug through the rubble in search of her books, but 'there was nothing left." 'My sole dream was to study medicine," Qanan said. 'I stopped thinking about it. All my thoughts now are about how to survive." Hundreds of thousands out of school More than 650,000 students have had no access to education since the start of the war, according to the UN children's agency, UNICEF. That includes nearly 40,000 students who were unable to take university entry exams that largely determine their career prospects. It's the first time in decades that the exams were not administered in Gaza. Israel's bombardment and ground operations have killed tens of thousands of Palestinians and displaced 90% of Gaza's population. School-age children in crowded shelters and tent camps are often forced to help their families find food, water and firewood. A complete Israeli blockade imposed in early March that was only slightly eased 2 ½ months later has driven the territory to the brink of famine. Local education officials, working with UNICEF and other aid groups, set up hundreds of learning spaces to try and provide education during the war. 'We're trying to salvage what we can of the educational process, so that the next generation doesn't slip through our fingers," said Mohamed al-Asouli, head of the education department in the southern city of Khan Younis. During a six-week ceasefire in January and February, some 600 learning spaces provided lessons for around 173,000 children, according to UNICEF. But since March, when Israel ended the truce with a surprise bombardment, nearly half have shut down. 'The impact goes beyond learning losses," said Rosalia Bollen, a UNICEF spokeswoman. 'Children in Gaza have been trapped in a cycle not just of exposure to unprecedented violence, but also a cycle of fear, of toxic stress, of anxiety." Two years of my life are gone Some have tried to continue their studies through online learning, but it's not easy in Gaza, where there has been no central electricity since the start of the war. Palestinians must use solar panels or hard-to-find generators to charge their phones, and internet is unreliable. 'The mobile phone is not always charged, and we only have one at home," said Nesma Zouaroub, a mother of four school-age children. She said her youngest son should be in second grade but does not know how to read or write. 'The children's future is ruined," she said. Ola Shaban tried to continue her civil engineering studies online through her university after the campus was destroyed by Israeli forces in April 2024. She had to walk long distances to get a signal in her hometown near Khan Younis, and she eventually gave up. 'I couldn't continue because of lack of internet, continuous displacement and the constant sense of fear," she said. 'Two years of my life are gone." Israel's offensive has killed over 57,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza's Health Ministry. The ministry, which is part of the Hamas-run government, does not differentiate between combatants and civilians but says over half the dead are women and children. Its figures are used by the UN and other international organisations as the most reliable statistics on war casualties. Hamas-led militants killed some 1,200 people in the Oct 7 attack and abducted 251. They are still holding 50 hostages, less than half believed to be alive, after most of the rest were released in ceasefire deals or other agreements. Qanan's father, Ibrahim, a local journalist, said his family did everything it could to support Sarah's ambition to study medicine, only to see it go up in smoke when the war broke out. 'The war stunned us and turned our life upside down," the father of six said. 'Our dreams and hopes were buried in the rubble of our home." (AP) NSA NSA (This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed - PTI) view comments First Published: Disclaimer: Comments reflect users' views, not News18's. Please keep discussions respectful and constructive. Abusive, defamatory, or illegal comments will be removed. News18 may disable any comment at its discretion. By posting, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
