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Palestinian health minister reports 29 ‘starvation-related' deaths in Gaza

Palestinian health minister reports 29 ‘starvation-related' deaths in Gaza

Yahoo22-05-2025

At least 29 children and elderly people have died from 'starvation-related' deaths in the Gaza Strip in recent days, the Palestinian health minister says, warning that thousands more are at risk as limited aid begins trickling into the bombarded enclave.
Majed Abu Ramadan told reporters on Thursday that earlier comments by the United Nations aid chief to the BBC that 14,000 babies could die without desperately needed food aid were 'very realistic', but could be an underestimation.
Israel has allowed limited deliveries of humanitarian assistance into Gaza amid a wave of international condemnation of its 11-week total blockade on the territory, which spurred warnings of mass famine.
But UN officials have said the aid entering Gaza is 'nowhere near enough' to meet the needs of the population in the war-torn enclave.
About 90 truckloads of aid entered Gaza on Thursday, but Abu Ramadan said most of what was allowed in was limited to 'flour for bakeries'.
The UN's World Food Programme (WFP) said on Thursday afternoon that 'a handful of bakeries in Gaza are baking bread again after receiving limited supplies overnight'.
'This is a critical first step – but assistance must be scaled up. More essential food is needed to push back the risk of famine. Bread alone is not enough for people to survive,' the agency said in a post on X.The president of the Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS), Younis al-Khatib, had earlier said many Palestinians had yet to receive any supplies so far. 'No civilian has received anything yet,' al-Khatib told reporters.
He said most of the aid trucks are still at the Karem Abu Salem crossing, known as Kerem Shalom to Israelis, in southern Gaza.
As limited deliveries enter the Strip, the Israeli military has continued to launch attacks across the enclave, with medical sources telling Al Jazeera that at least 51 Palestinians have been killed since dawn on Thursday.
At least 53,655 Palestinians have been killed and more than 121,000 others injured since Israel's war on Gaza began in October 2023, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.
Israeli military spokesman Avichay Adraee also announced new forced evacuation orders for Palestinians in Jabalia and Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza. He said in a post on X that the army will 'significantly expand its military activity' in the area.
Reporting from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, Al Jazeera's Tareq Abu Azzoum said that while Palestinians have welcomed the influx of aid, it is a 'drop in the ocean' compared with the population's needs.
'Five hundred aid trucks are needed on a daily basis in order to avert the current food crisis in the territory,' Abu Azzoum explained.
Still, Gaza resident Ahmed Abed al-Daym said the aid trucks were a 'positive sign' amid dire conditions.
'Our homes are empty – there is no bread, and our children are going hungry,' he told Al Jazeera.
'In many households, bread has completely disappeared. What people urgently need is a steady and sufficient flow of flour and other essentials. Unfortunately, the limited aid that has entered so far falls far short of meeting our needs.'Another resident, Reem Zidiah, said that due to the mass starvation that Gaza is enduring, no one is safe in the besieged enclave.
'All of us here in Gaza, we don't think about tomorrow because we don't know what will happen tomorrow – whether we're going to live or die,' Zidiah told Al Jazeera.
Meanwhile, Action Against Hunger teams on the ground in southern Gaza warned that there was less than a seven-days' supply of food to prevent acute malnutrition in children.
Natalia Anguera, the humanitarian group's head of Middle East operations, said 'flour has come in and some bakeries in the south have resumed operations'.
However, she stressed that 'specific nutritional supplies reserves for children under five are about to run out'.

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World fertility rates in 'unprecedented decline', UN says

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Palestinians say Israel and its allies fired on crowd near Gaza aid site. Hospital says 6 killed
Palestinians say Israel and its allies fired on crowd near Gaza aid site. Hospital says 6 killed

San Francisco Chronicle​

time19 hours ago

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Palestinians say Israel and its allies fired on crowd near Gaza aid site. Hospital says 6 killed

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At least four killed by Israeli fire near Gaza food point, officials say
At least four killed by Israeli fire near Gaza food point, officials say

Yahoo

time21 hours ago

  • Yahoo

At least four killed by Israeli fire near Gaza food point, officials say

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Coverage of the war in Gaza is constrained by Israeli attacks on Palestinian journalists and a bar on international reporters entering the Gaza Strip to report independently on the war. Israel has not allowed foreign reporters to enter Gaza since 7 October 2023, unless they are under Israeli military escort. Reporters who join these trips have no control over where they go, and other restrictions include a bar on speaking to Palestinians in Gaza. Palestinian journalists and media workers inside Gaza have paid a heavy price for their work reporting on the war, with over 180 killed since the conflict began. The committee to protect journalists has determined that at least 19 of them 'were directly targeted by Israeli forces in killings which CPJ classifies as murders'. Foreign reporters based in Israel filed a legal petition seeking access to Gaza, but it was rejected by the supreme court on security grounds. Private lobbying by diplomats and public appeals by prominent journalists and media outlets have been ignored by the Israeli government. To ensure accurate reporting from Gaza given these restrictions, the Guardian works with trusted journalists on the ground; our visual​​ teams verif​y photo and videos from third parties; and we use clearly sourced data from organisations that have a track record of providing accurate information in Gaza during past conflicts, or during other conflicts or humanitarian crises. Emma Graham-Harrison, chief Middle East correspondent The GHF announced on Wednesday that its operations would be suspended for 24 hours after Israeli troops opened fire on a crowd of Palestinians, as it pressed Israel to improve civilian safety beyond the perimeter of its distribution sites. Israeli troops killed at least 27 people and injured hundreds on Tuesday far beyond the perimeter of the distribution sites. They denied firing at civilians, but an Israel Defense Forces official admitted soldiers had fired 'warning shots toward several suspects who advanced toward the troops' near the food distribution site, without specifying who the suspects were. On 1 June, 31 Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire as they went to receive food. Israel said it had fired warning shots towards several suspects who advanced towards troops. Israel imposed a blockade on all supplies to Gaza in March, saying Hamas was seizing deliveries for its fighters, which the group denies. A global hunger monitor said in May that half a million people in the strip faced starvation. The IPC estimated that nearly 71,000 children under five were expected to be 'acutely malnourished', with 14,100 cases expected to be severe in the next 11 months. The hubs are set up inside Israeli military zones, to which independent media have no access, and are run by GHF, a new group of mainly US contractors. Israel wants it to replace a system coordinated by the UN and international aid groups. The UN and other humanitarian organisations have rejected the new system, saying the GHF will not be able to meet the needs of Gaza's 2.3 million people and that it allows Israel to use food as a weapon to control the population. Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report

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