Thousands of children in Gaza are malnourished amid Israel's blockade : Aid groups - War on Gaza
Aid groups are raising new alarm over Israel's blockade of the war-ravaged Gaza Strip, where no food or other supplies have been allowed in for more than six weeks.
Thousands of children are malnourished, and most people are only eating one meal every other day, the United Nations says.
Israel ended a ceasefire last month and renewed its bombardment, killing hundreds of people and seizing large parts of the territory. Israeli strikes overnight into Thursday killed at least 37 people, including a family of 10.
Nearly all rely on charity kitchens
The U.N. humanitarian office, known as OCHA, said that almost all of Gaza's more than 2 million people now rely on charity kitchens supported by aid groups, which can prepare just 1 million meals a day.
Other food distribution programs have shut down for lack of supplies, and the U.N. and other aid groups have been sending their remaining stocks to the charity kitchens.
The only other way to get food in Gaza is from markets. But prices are spiralling and shortages are widespread, meaning humanitarian aid is the primary food source for 80% of the population, the World Food Program said in its monthly report for April.
'The Gaza Strip is now likely facing the worst humanitarian crisis in the 18 months since the escalation of hostilities in October 2023,' OCHA said.
Most people in Gaza are now down to one meal a day, said Shaina Low, a spokesperson for the Norwegian Refugee Council. 'It's far lower than what is needed,' she said.
Water is also growing scarce, with Palestinians standing in long lines to fill jerry cans from trucks. Omar Shatat, an official with a local water utility, said people are down to six or seven liters per day, well below the amount the U.N. estimates is needed to meet basic needs.
More hungry children, and they are harder to reach
In March, more than 3,600 children were newly admitted for treatment for acute malnutrition, up from around 2,000 the month before, according to OCHA, which said "the rapid deterioration of the nutrition situation is already visible.'
At the same time, aid groups' ability to treat malnourished children is hampered by Israel's airstrikes and ground operations, which resumed on March 18.
In March, the number of children under 5 that aid workers could supply with nutrient supplements fell 70% from February, down to 22,300 children – a fraction of the 29,000 children they aim to reach. Only 60% of the 173 treatment sites are operating, and demand for the dwindling supplies is rising, OCHA said.
"Humanitarians have been forced to watch people suffer and die while carrying the impossible burden of providing relief with depleted supplies, all while facing the same life-threatening conditions themselves,' said Amande Bazerolle, the emergency coordinator in Gaza for Doctors Without Borders.
'This is not a humanitarian failure — it is a political choice, and a deliberate assault on a people's ability to survive, carried out with impunity,' she said in a statement.
Hani Almadhoun, co-founder of Gaza Soup Kitchen, said his kitchen has food for about three more weeks.
'But food is loosely defined. We have pasta and rice, but nothing much beyond that. No fresh produce. There is no chicken or beef. The only thing we have is canned meat,' he said. He said 15-20% of the people who come to his kitchen for food leave empty-handed.
Israel's war has killed over 51,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.
The war has destroyed vast parts of Gaza and most of its food production capabilities. The war has displaced around 90% of the population, with hundreds of thousands of people living in tent camps and bombed-out buildings.
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Egypt Independent
3 days ago
- Egypt Independent
Aid to Gaza hangs by a thread amid looting and starvation
CNN — Israel's blockade of Gaza may have been partially lifted – and a new US-backed plan to deliver aid has begun. But there are multiple indications that the plight of Gazans is rapidly worsening. Restrictions imposed by the Israeli military on aid routes, ongoing airstrikes, a lack of security and the continuous displacement of tens of thousands of people are aggravating an already alarming situation, according to the UN and other aid agencies. The supplies that do get in risk getting looted. 'People in Gaza are starving. This demands the urgent opening of all crossings and allowing unimpeded access for humanitarian organizations to deliver aid at scale, through multiple routes,' the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in its latest assessment. One woman, Umm Zuhair, who was trying to get food for her family on Sunday at one of newly established aid distribution sites, told CNN: 'We're so hungry that we're willing to risk getting shot just for a kilo of flour.' The number of children in Gaza with acute malnutrition is rising, the UN reported Saturday, while a lack of fuel threatens to close hospitals that are still operating. The Israeli agency handling the inspection of aid going into Gaza, the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), said Saturday that 350 trucks containing humanitarian aid had entered the Gaza Strip through the Kerem Shalom crossing in the last week – less than 20 per cent of the volume of goods getting into Gaza before the conflict. And even the aid that gets in frequently does not make it to the most desperate. UN agencies report continuing difficulties with getting distribution routes within Gaza agreed with the Israeli military. OCHA said that out of 16 truckloads ready for distribution last Thursday, five were rejected, including fuel and water, and six failed to reach their destination. Additionally, the looting of aid convoys in Gaza has risen sharply in recent weeks. 'Operations have faced unprecedented levels of insecurity and a very high risk of looting, with partners reporting that most looting incidents are conducted by desperate civilians,' according to OCHA. People carry relief supplies from the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) in central Gaza on Sunday. Eyad Baba/AFP/Getty Images Nahed Shehaibar, head of the Private Transport Association in Gaza, said on Saturday that transport of aid had been suspended 'for the third consecutive day due to repeated attacks on trucks, including gunfire that has damaged and put several trucks out of service.' Last week the association reported that one driver was killed and another injured while trying to deliver aid, but Shehaibar said on Sunday that 11 trucks of commercial goods had reached merchants in Deir al-Balah in central Gaza successfully. The distribution of aid through the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), the US and Israeli-backed aid initiative that started operating late last month, has been dogged by security issues. On Sunday, GHF said it operated three distribution sites – two in southern Gaza and one in central Gaza – to hand out more than 17,000 boxes of food. In addition, GHF said in its daily update that it gave more than 10,000 meals to community leaders north of Rafah in what the organization called a pilot test of 'direct-to-community distribution.' But many people who went to the Netzarim site in central Gaza left empty-handed. Mohammad Salim told CNN: 'I went at 6 a.m. and found nothing. What's happening is shameful. I'm holding an empty cardboard box – there's nothing inside, not even lentils.' He said some people took more than they needed and complained there was no ID-based distribution system, as operated by the UN. CNN has previously reported that GHF has no system in place to screen aid recipients. Nader Musleh, who had walked from Al-Mawasi several kilometers away, agreed. 'Some people took five or 10 boxes, and there's no organization at all,' he said. Mohammad Abu Akouz was one of several civilians who alleged that some people were injured after coming under Israeli tank fire as they made their way to the site. An Israeli military official told CNN that Israeli forces fired what they called 'warning shots' from an armored vehicle approximately a kilometer from the distribution site. The official said the area is an active war zone. GHF said it had been unable to open its sites on Saturday, accusing Hamas of making threats against its operations, including against drivers and Palestinian workers. It said the threats had made it impossible to proceed without putting innocent lives at risk. A driver familiar with the operation, who asked not to be named for security reasons, told CNN on Sunday that Hamas had 'threatened the bus drivers responsible for transporting workers to the three American aid distribution points, warning them not to continue the transfers.' The drivers had been scheduled to move 180 employees to the three distribution sites, he added. GHF said on Friday that it had distributed more than 140,000 boxes of food, with each box intended to feed a family for half a week. The boxes contain pasta, lentils and cooking oil, among other products. GHF says its goal is to distribute boxes containing enough food for 4.5 million meals each day. Palestinians pray during a funeral for those who were killed on their way to a Gaza aid hub at the Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, Gaza, on June 1. Abdel Kareem Hana/AP After last week's shootings, GHF appealed to people not to arrive at distribution points 'before the official opening time or gather near the gates ahead of schedule. This is for your safety and the safety of others.' The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said Saturday in a post on X that gathering outside distribution centers outside of announced hours was 'strictly prohibited,' and warned that the areas around the aid hubs were closed military zones between 6 p.m. (11 a.m. ET) and 6 a.m. (11 p.m. ET). The UN says that the use of the Israeli and American-backed GHF has militarized aid distribution and is inadequate for the huge task of feeding families in Gaza. GHF has no presence in northern Gaza. In its latest assessment, OCHA said that 90 per cent of families in Gaza lack the cash needed to buy what little food remains available in markets. 'Meat, dairy, vegetables and fruit are nearly absent from people's diets,' it said. Half of the community kitchens in Gaza have been forced to stop cooking due to lack of supplies or displacement orders, according to OCHA. The UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) – the main agency for supplying aid in Gaza – said Saturday that a nutrition study had found that the percentage of children under 5 suffering from acute malnutrition had risen from 4.7% in the first half of May to 5.8% in the second half of the month. UNRWA said the number of children forced to fend for themselves had pushed an increasing number into 'dangerous survival strategies. Children are reported working on the streets, participating in looting or gathering within large crowds in search of food supplies at insecure distribution points.' It's not just food that is running chronically short. Dr. Mohamed Abu Salmiya, director of Al-Shifa Hospital in northern Gaza, told CNN on Sunday that the few hospitals in Gaza still operating 'will completely shut down within two days if fuel does not enter.' He added that 'a large number of the wounded cannot be treated due to the lack of blood supplies and medical equipment,' and medical staff faced difficult choices about which patients to save. The Palestinian Ministry of Health said Sunday that Al-Shifa Hospital and the Baptist Ahli Hospital, both in northern Gaza, were at risk of shutting down service within 24 hours. It said that would mean the collapse of what remains of the healthcare system in Gaza City. In the south, the Health Ministry said the Nasser Medical Complex was operating on a limited fuel supply that will last no more than two days.
Wakala News
5 days ago
- Wakala News
‘Open prison': The forced labour driving India's $5 trillion economy dream
Amid the relentless clatter of machinery, Ravi Kumar Gupta feeds a roaring steel furnace with scrap, blown metal and molten iron. He carefully adds chemicals tailored to the type of steel being produced, adjusting fuel and airflow with precision to keep the furnace running smoothly. As his shift ends about 4pm, he stops briefly at a roadside tea shop just outside the gates of the steel factory in Maharashtra state's Tarapur Industrial Area. His safety helmet is still on, but his feet, instead of being shielded by boots, are in worn-out slippers – scant protection against the molten metal he works with. His eyes are bloodshot with exhaustion, and his green, full-sleeved shirt and faded, torn blue jeans are stained with grease and sweat. Four years after migrating from Barabanki, a district in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, Ravi earns $175 per month – $25 less than India's monthly per capita income. And the paycheques are often delayed, arriving only between the 10th and 12th of each month. Middlemen, who are either locals or longterm migrants posing as locals, supply labour to factories in Maharashtra, India's industrial heartland. In return, the middlemen skim between $11 and $17 from each worker's wages. In addition, $7 is deducted monthly from their pay for canteen food, which consists of limited portions of rice, dal and vegetables for lunch, as well as evening tea. Asked why he continues to work at the steel factory, Ravi responds with resignation in his voice: 'What else can I do?' Giving up his job isn't an option. His family – two young daughters in school, his wife and mother who work on their small plot of farmland, and his ailing father who is unable to work – depend on the $100 a month that he is able to send home. Climate change, he says, has 'ruined farming', the family's traditional occupation. 'The rains don't come when they should. The land no longer feeds us. And where are the jobs in our village? There's nothing left. So, like the others, I left,' he says, his thick, calloused hands wrapped around a cup of tea. Ravi is a cog in the wheel of the soaring dreams of the world's fifth-largest economy. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has boldly spoken of making India a $5 trillion economy, up from $3.5 trillion in 2023. But as Modi's government woos global investors and assures them that it is easy today to do business in India, Ravi is among millions of workers whose stories of withheld wages, endless toil and coercion – telltale signs of forced labour, according to the United Nations' International Labour Organization (ILO) – provide a haunting snapshot of the ugly underbelly of the country's economy. Farm to furnace The Factories Act of 1948, which governs working conditions in steel mills like the one where Ravi works, mandates annual paid leave for workers who have been employed for 240 days or more in a year. However, workers like Ravi do not receive paid leave. Any day taken off is unpaid, regardless of the reason. Like many others, Ravi is required to work all seven days a week, totalling 30 days a month, despite the fact that Sundays were officially declared a weekly holiday for all labourers in India as far back as 1890. Workers in many Indian factories do not receive a salary slip detailing their earnings and deductions. This lack of transparency leaves them in the dark about how much money has been deducted – or why. Worse still, if a worker is absent for three or four consecutive days, their entry card is deactivated. Upon returning, they are treated as a new employee. This reclassification affects their eligibility for important benefits such as the provident fund and end-of-service gratuity. In many cases, workers are forced to rejoin under these unfair terms simply because their pending wages – either direct from the company or via the middlemen – have not been paid. Walking away would mean forfeiting their hard-earned money. In addition to all this, Ravi confirms that neither he nor his colleagues, both in his company and in nearby factories within the industrial area, have received any written contracts outlining their job roles or employment benefits. According to a 2025 study (PDF) published in the Indian Journal of Legal Review, many workers face exploitation through unfair contracts, wage theft and forced labour due to the absence of written agreements. These practices particularly affect more vulnerable groups like migrants, women and low-skilled workers, who often have limited access to legal recourse. Al Jazeera contacted the Maharashtra Labour Commissioner on May 20 seeking a response to concerns around forced labour in industries where workers like Ravi are employed, but has not received a reply. There is also the absence of adequate safety gear: Ravi works near the furnace, where temperatures cross 50 degrees Celsius (122 degrees Fahrenheit). But workers aren't provided with protective glass. 'Neither the middlemen nor the employer gives us even the most basic safety gear,' he says. Yet, helplessness wins. 'We know how dangerous it is. We know what we need to stay safe,' he says. 'But what choice do we have? 'When you're desperate, you have no choice but to adapt to these harsh, uncertain conditions,' he said. 'If I get thrown out, what then?' In the port town of Kakinada, along India's Bay of Bengal coast – about 1,400km (870 miles) from where Ravi works – 47-year-old Sumitha Salomi earns even less than him. A shrimp peeler, Sumitha has no formal job contract with the factory where she works. Like many others, she has been hired through a contractor – a woman from her own village. The factory, a heavily fortified facility that exports peeled vannamei shrimp to the United States, employs migrant workers from the neighbouring state of Odisha and other regions. The premises are tightly guarded, and access is strictly controlled. But in the villages where the factory's workers live, a common story emerges: None of them have written contracts. No one has social security or health benefits. The only work gear they have are gloves and caps – not for their safety, but to maintain hygiene standards for the exported shrimp. India exported shrimp worth $2.7bn to the US in the 2023-24 fiscal year, according to official figures. Sumitha explains that her pay depends on the weight of the shrimp she peels. 'The only break we get is about 30 minutes for lunch. For women, even when we're in severe menstrual pain, there's no rest, no relief. We just keep working,' she says. She earns about $4.50 a day. She knows the precarity of her job. Her wages are handed to her in cash, without any payslip, leaving her with no way to contest what she receives. As a divorced mother, Sumitha carries the burden of multiple responsibilities. She's still repaying loans she took for her elder daughter's marriage, while also trying to keep her younger daughter in school. On top of that, she cares for her elderly widowed mother who needs cancer medication that costs about $10 a month. But she does not question the factory bosses about her working conditions or the absence of a written contract. 'I have a job – contract or no contract. That's what matters,' she says, her voice stoic. 'There are no other jobs here in this village. If I start asking questions and get thrown out, what then?' Unlike seasoned veteran Sumitha, 23-year-old Minnu Samay is still grappling with the harsh realities of her job in the seafood industry. Minnu, a migrant worker from the eastern state of Odisha, is employed at a shrimp processing factory located within the high-security Krishnapatnam Port area in Nellore, about 500km (310 mile) south of Kakinada. Migrant workers like Minnu are allowed to leave the factory just once a week for about three hours, mainly to buy essentials in Muthukur, a village 10km (6 miles) from the factory. As she hurries through the narrow market lanes, picking up sanitary pads and snacks during this brief window of freedom, she tells her story. 'I was 19 when I left home. Poverty forced me. My parents were deep in debt after marrying off my two sisters. It was hard to survive,' Minnu says. 'So when we met an agent in our town, he arranged this job here.' Slowly, she has learned while on the job, cutting and peeling shrimp. Minnu earns approximately $110 per month. 'We know we're being exploited, our freedom is restricted, we have no health insurance or proper rights, and we're constantly under surveillance,' she says. 'But like many of my coworkers, we don't have other options. We just adjust and keep going.' Most overtime work is not paid, she said. 'We're watched by cameras every moment, trapped in what feels like an open prison,' she says. On May 20, Al Jazeera sent queries to the Andhra Pradesh Labour Department, and on May 22, to the Indian Ministry of Labour, seeking responses to concerns over widespread forced labour in industries where workers like Sumitha and Minnu are employed. Kakinada and Nellore are in Andhra Pradesh state. Neither the Andhra Pradesh Labour Department nor the federal Indian Ministry of Labour has responded. Labour rights experts say that these stories lay bare the urgent need for enforceable contracts, the abolition of exploitative hiring practices and initiatives to educate workers about their rights – vital measures to combat forced labour in India's unorganised and semi-organised sectors. On March 24, India's federal Labour Minister Shobha Karandlaje told parliament that approximately 307 million unorganised workers (PDF), including migrant workers, were registered under an Indian government scheme. But researchers say that the true scale of India's unorganised workforce is likely even larger. 'Concealed' forced labour Benoy Peter, executive director of the Centre for Migration and Inclusive Development (CMID), a civil society organisation based in the southern Indian state of Kerala, cited a document (PDF) from India's National Sample Survey Organization, which said that the country's total workforce is approximately 470 million in strength. Of this, about 80 million workers are in the organised sector, while the remaining 390 million – more than the entire population of the United States – are in the unorganised sector. The UN International Labour Organization's India Employment Report 2024 (PDF) supports Benoy's observation, stating that low-quality jobs in the informal sector and informal employment are the dominant forms of work in India. The ILO report said that 90 percent of India's workforce is 'informally employed'. And many of these workers are victims of forced or bonded labour. India ratified the ILO's Forced Labour Convention 29 in 1954 and abolished bonded labour in 1975. Yet, according to the Walk Free Foundation, India has the highest estimated number of people living in modern slavery worldwide, with 11.05 million individuals (eight in every 1,000) affected. The real numbers, again, are likely worse. In 2016, the then Indian Labour Minister Bandaru Dattatreya informed Parliament that the country had an estimated 18.4 million bonded labourers, and that the government was working to release and rehabilitate them by 2030. But in December 2021, when Indian parliamentarian Mohammad Jawed inquired (PDF) about this target in parliament, the government stated that only approximately 12,000 bonded labourers had been rescued and rehabilitated between 2016 and 2021. The textile sector is among the worst offenders. According to a parliamentary document from March this year, the southern Tamil Nadu state led textile and apparel exports, including handicrafts, with a value of $7.1bn. Gujarat, Modi's home state, followed in second place, exporting $5.7bn worth of these goods. Thivya Rakini, president of the Tamil Nadu Textile and Common Labour Union (TTCU), says that in a decade of visiting factories to work with garment workers, she has, in almost all instances, seen at least one – and often multiple – indicators of forced labour as defined by the ILO. Those indicators include intimidation, excessive overtime, withheld wages, sexual harassment, and physical violence, such as slapping or beating workers for failing to meet production targets. India's textiles industry has around 45 million workers, including 3.5 million handloom workers across the country. 'Forced labour in the textile industry is widespread and often concealed,' Thivya says. 'It's not a random occurrence. It stems directly from the business model of fashion brands. When brands pay suppliers low prices, demand large volumes on tight deadlines, and fail to ensure freedom of association or basic grievance mechanisms for workers, they create an environment ripe for forced labour.' Women make up 60-80 percent of the garment workforce, she says. 'Many lack formal contracts, earn less than men for the same work, and face frequent violence and harassment,' she said. Many are from marginalised groups – Dalits, migrants or single mothers – making them even more vulnerable in a patriarchal society. Other sectors are plagued by forced labour too. Transparentem, an independent, nonprofit organisation focused on uncovering and addressing human rights and environmental abuses in global supply chains, investigated 90 cotton farms in the central state of Madhya Pradesh from June 2022 to March 2023 and released its final report (PDF) in January 2025, uncovering child labour, forced labour and unsafe conditions: Children were handling pesticides without protection. 'No choice but to tolerate exploitation' Between 2019 and 2020, the Indian government consolidated 29 federal labour laws into four comprehensive codes. The stated aim of these reforms was to improve the ease of doing business while ensuring worker welfare. As part of this effort, the total number of compliance provisions was significantly reduced – from more than 1,200 to 479. However, while many states have drafted rules needed to implement these codes, there has still not been a nationwide rollout of these laws. Supporters of the new labour codes argue that they modernise outdated laws and provide greater legal clarity. Critics, however, particularly trade unions, warn that the reforms favour employers and dilute worker protections. One of the codes, for instance, makes it harder to register a workers union. A union must now have a minimum of 10 percent of the workers or 100 workers, whichever is less, in an establishment to be members of a union, a significant rise from the earlier requirement of just seven workers under the Trade Unions Act, 1926. Santosh Poonia from India Labour Line – a helpline initiative that supports workers, especially in the unorganised sector, by offering legal aid, mediation and counselling services – tells Al Jazeera that if workers are barred from forming unions, that would weaken their collective bargaining rights. 'Without these rights, they will have no choice but to tolerate exploitative working conditions,' he says. To Sanjay Ghose, a senior labour law lawyer practising at the Indian Supreme Court, the problem runs deeper than the new consolidated codes. 'The real issue is the failure to implement these laws effectively, which leaves workers vulnerable,' he says. Ghose warns that India's stagnating job creation could compound the exploitation and forced labour among workers. India's top engineering schools, the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), have long prided themselves on how the world's biggest banks, tech giants and other multinationals queue up at their gates each year to lure their graduates with massive pay packages. Yet, the percentage of graduates from the IITs who secure jobs as they leave school has dropped sharply, by 10 percentage points, since 2021, when the Indian economy took a major hit from COVID-19 – a hit it hasn't fully recovered from. 'Even graduates with high ranks from premier institutions like the IITs are struggling to secure job placements,' Ghose says. 'With limited options available, job seekers are forced to accept whatever work they can find. This leads to exploitation, unfair working conditions, and, in some cases, forced labour.' Pramod Kumar, a former United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) senior adviser, adds that weakened private investment and foreign direct investment (FDI) have made national growth largely dependent on government spending. Consequently, job opportunities are primarily limited to the informal sector, where unfair working conditions are prevalent, leading to exploitation and forced labour. Private sector investment in India dropped to a three-year low of 11.2 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) in fiscal year 2024, down from the pre-COVID average of 11.8 percent (fiscal years 2016-2020), according to ratings firm India Ratings & Research. Additionally, FDI in India declined by 5.6 percent year-on-year to $10.9bn in the October-December quarter of the last fiscal year, driven by global economic uncertainties. Against that economic backdrop, Poonia, from the India Labour Line, says he can't see how the government plans to meet its ambitious target of rescuing 18 million bonded labourers in India. He said he expects the opposite. 'The situation is going to worsen when the ease of doing business is prioritised over human rights and workers' rights.'
Al-Ahram Weekly
6 days ago
- Al-Ahram Weekly
Eid begins in Gaza with outdoor prayers amongst ruins and food growing ever scarcer - War on Gaza
Palestinians across the war-ravaged Gaza Strip marked the start of one of Islam's most important holidays with prayers outside destroyed mosques and homes early Friday, with little hope the Israeli genocidal war will end soon. With much of Gaza in rubble, men and children were forced to hold the traditional Eid al-Adha prayers in the open air and with food supplies dwindling, families were having to make do with what they could scrape together for the three-day feast. 'This is the worst feast that the Palestinian people have experienced because of the unjust war against the Palestinian people,' said Kamel Emran after attending prayers in the southern city of Khan Younis. 'There is no food, no flour, no shelter, no mosques, no homes, no mattresses ... The conditions are very, very harsh.' The holiday begins on the 10th day of the Islamic lunar month of Dhul-Hijja, during the Hajj season in Saudi Arabia. For the second year, Muslims in Gaza were not able to travel to Saudi Arabia to perform the traditional pilgrimage. Since the Israeli genocidal war in Gaza started on October 2023, the occupation army has killed more than 54,600 Palestinians, most of them women and children, with over 125,500 others injured, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry. The Israeli brutal war has destroyed large parts of Gaza and displaced around 90% of its population of roughly 2 million Palestinians. After blocking all food and aid from entering Gaza for more than two months, Israel began allowing a trickle of supplies to enter for the UN several weeks ago. But the UN says it has been unable to distribute much of the aid because of Israeli army restrictions on movements and because roads that the military designates for its trucks to use are unsafe and vulnerable to looters. The UN's Food and Agriculture Organization in Rome said Thursday that Gaza's people are projected to fall into acute food insecurity by September, with nearly 500,000 people experiencing extreme food deprivation, leading to malnutrition and starvation. 'This means the risk of famine is really touching the whole of the Gaza Strip,' Rein Paulson, director of the FAO office of emergencies and resilience, said in an interview. The UN says that the number of Gaza children facing acute malnutrition has soared since February, with more than 2,700 now suffering from it. Over the past two weeks, shootings have erupted nearly daily in the Gaza Strip in the vicinity of new hubs where desperate Palestinians are being directed to collect food. Witnesses say nearby Israeli troops have opened fire, killing more than 80 people. The US so-called Humanitarian Foundation, a newly formed group of mainly American contractors that Israel wants to use to replace humanitarian groups in Gaza that distribute aid in coordination with the UN, said Friday that all its distribution centers were closed for the day due to the ongoing Israeli violence. It urged people to stay away for their own safety, and said it would make an announcement later as to when they would resume distributing humanitarian aid. * This story was edited by Ahram Online. Follow us on: Facebook Instagram Whatsapp Short link:
