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The National
6 days ago
- Health
- The National
UN famine expert: Trauma and shame of Israel's starvation of Gaza will last generations
The trauma and shame inflicted on Gaza as it starves under an Israeli blockade will last for generations, a UN expert on famine has told The National. The pain felt by parents helplessly watching their children fade away, the lengths for survival that some have had to go to like eating rotten flour, picking up chickpeas from the ground that someone else had left behind, or eating animal fodder – all of these experiences of suffering are bound to be carried forward, said the UN 's special rapporteur on the right to food, Michael Fakhri. 'Starvation campaigns create a social trauma because if you survive, then you've had to make impossible decisions and decide who to feed and deny food,' said Mr Fakhri, who has spoken to descendants of people affected by Ireland's famine in the 19th century. The survivors of times like these would have had to endure watching others slowly die in agony, Mr Fakhri said. 'There's a sense of shame for having survived, and it is very difficult to speak about publicly and recover from it psychologically.' Officials in Gaza say at least 113 people, many of them children, have died of starvation during Israel 's blockade on life-sustaining aid, which includes baby food. On top of that, almost all of Gaza's population of 2.2 million people is displaced, the death toll from direct bombardment is inching towards 60,000 with more than 143,000 injured, and living conditions are squalid, unsafe and rife with disease. Israel's government maintains it is not to blame for harrowing images of emaciated children in Gaza begging for food, or crying at some of the last remaining charity kitchens for a spoonful of beans. It says there are unused aid supplies in Gaza and accuses Hamas and the UN of preventing their delivery. In the past 24 hours, two new deaths were recorded from malnutrition and hunger. As the UN inches closer to declaring a famine in Gaza, the clearest tell-tale sign of famine is how it affects the youngest in a population, Mr Fakhri said. 'When children start dying from hunger and malnutrition, you know there's a famine because any community – when there's hunger – will feed their children, and adults will deny themselves food for days to prioritise their children,' he said. So when those children begin to die from hunger, as in Gaza, Mr Fakhri said, it can be concluded that there is a famine and that the entire social structure of that community is under attack. But while the semantics over what constitutes a famine are being discussed, Mr Fakhri said it is not debatable that Israel is inflicting mass starvation on Gaza, in what he describes as a war crime. Starvation is not only the direct deprivation of food, he said, as a person can be held liable for the crime of starvation if they wilfully impede relief supplies. Israel has blocked large quantities of aid from entering Gaza since at least March. 'The denial of food, water, medicine and destruction of homes, is starvation,' Mr Fakhri said. 'You don't have to measure the impact and count dead bodies and measure misery to wait to find that there is starvation. All you need to show is intent and action.' Another of the world's leading experts on famine, Alex DeWaal, compared this diagnosis to a physician not needing to look at a patient's test results to determine the disease they have. Whether it's under the legal definition of starvation according to international humanitarian law, or the UN 's Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), which has its own technical definition of famine, Mr Fakhri said: 'By any definition, Israel has conducted a starvation campaign'. In November last year, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the Minister of Defence at the time, Yoav Gallant, for the war crime of starvation. They remain free and Israel continues to deny the impact it has had on the population.
The National
6 days ago
- Politics
- The National
The enduring consequences of mass starvation in Gaza
Hunger has killed more than 110 people so far in Gaza over the past 20 months of war. And in the past week, the number of deaths has accelerated, causing alarm about a looming full-scale famine in the strip. More than 100 NGOs have warned of mass starvation, and a coalition of mostly European states issued strong words condemning Israel's aid policy. Israel insists there is no famine in Gaza, and blames Hamas for food shortages. Yet haunting images and videos show emaciated children crying for food as their parents stare at them helplessly. Journalists who have covered the war since the start say they are too exhausted to work any more and that people are collapsing on the streets. In this episode of Beyond the Headlines, host Nada AlTaher speaks to experts about the irreversible impact of famine spreading in Gaza and how aid is being exploited for political gain. We hear from Michael Fakhri, the UN special rapporteur on the right to food, and Alex DeWaal, executive director of the World Peace Foundation.
Al Jazeera
21-07-2025
- Politics
- Al Jazeera
Why is the UN not declaring famine in Gaza?
On July 9, 2024, no fewer than 11 experts mandated by the United Nations Human Rights Council issued a mayday call about famine in Gaza. 'We declare that Israel's intentional and targeted starvation campaign against the Palestinian people is a form of genocidal violence and has resulted in famine across all of Gaza. We call upon the international community to prioritise the delivery of humanitarian aid by land by any means necessary, end Israel's siege, and establish a ceasefire,' their statement read. Among the experts were Michael Fakhri, special rapporteur on the right to food, Pedro Arrojo-Agudo, special rapporteur on the human rights to safe drinking water and sanitation, and Francesca Albanese, special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967. In their opinion, the death of children from starvation despite attempts to provide them with medical treatment in central Gaza left no room for equivocation. While 'famine' is generally understood as an acute lack of nutrition which would lead to starvation and death of a group of people or an entire population, there is no universally accepted definition of the concept in international law. However, in 2004, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) developed the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), a five-stage quantitative humanitarian scale to map the food insecurity of a population. The aim of this evaluation instrument is to spur collective action when food insecurity is identified and prevent such situations from reaching Level 5 on the IPC scale when famine is confirmed and declared. It has been used by FAO, the World Food Programme (WFP) and their partners as a scientific, data-driven tool for the past 20 years. The IPC quantifiable criteria for declaring famine are gruesomely straightforward: 20 percent or more of households in an area face extreme food shortages with a limited ability to cope; acute malnutrition in children exceeds 30 percent; and the death rate exceeds two people per 10,000 per day. When these three benchmarks are met, 'famine' needs to be declared. Although it does not trigger legal or treaty obligations, it is nevertheless an important political signal to compel an international humanitarian action. If the aforementioned experts could conclude, in unison and over a year ago, that famine was present in the besieged Gaza Strip, it is hard to understand why the competent UN entities and executive heads have not yet reached the conclusion that Level 5 has been reached by July of this year, after over four months of a medieval siege. In the era of real-time information transmitted to smartphones the world over, the reality of fatal levels of food insecurity is glaring and unconscionable. Images of emaciated bodies reminiscent of those taken in Nazi concentration camps tell the macabre tale of the reality in Gaza, blockaded by the uncompromising Israeli occupation forces. And yet, even against the backdrop of UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) warnings issued on July 20 that one million children in Gaza are facing the risk of starvation, 'famine' is not yet declared. On the surface, the explanation for not declaring 'famine' in Gaza is that the necessary data used under the IPC scheme is not available. This may well be the case since Israel prevents access to the Gaza Strip to journalists and some humanitarian workers. IPC analysts, therefore, do not have primary data collection capabilities, which they have for the other 30 or so situations they monitor. But when the physical evidence is plain to see, when some reliable data is available, humanitarian considerations ought to override technical requirements. However, in today's UN system culture transfixed by a US administration gone amok against it, political considerations override the sense of duty and professional imperatives. Those at the helm know what is right (or one hopes so) — and what could be fatal to their persona and careers. The US government's ad hominem attacks against and sanctions imposed on Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) Karim Khan and UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese are a vivid reminder that those jobs are not without risks. In the case of Albanese, her mandate is not even a 'job' as she is carrying it out pro bono, which makes her steadfastness and courage all the more exemplary. Admittedly, UN executive heads such as Secretary-General Antonio Guterres have more complex calculations to contend with, punitive actions by some powers on the organisation they lead being the principal one. As the saying goes, 'money talks' and the US is the single largest contributor to the UN system. But now that the US Congress has passed an unprecedented bill defunding the UN system, not doing what is right to shield the concerned UN organisations from Washington's retaliatory wrath is no longer an acceptable cop-out, if it ever was. It is important here to remember that the Statute of the ICC provides that starvation of civilians constitutes a war crime when committed in international armed conflicts. The full siege of Gaza since March 2, which is resulting in the starvation of civilians, first and foremost infants and children, falls squarely within the purview of Article 8 of the Statute, all the more so as it is the result of a deliberate and declaratory policy denying humanitarian assistance for months. In this man-made famine, Palestinians are starving to death amid the deafening silence of the world, while tonnes of food are going to waste on the Egyptian side of the border while awaiting permission to enter Gaza. Israeli troops and foreign mercenaries hired by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation have killed more than 900 Palestinians seeking aid at so-called humanitarian distribution sites. Some 90,000 children and women are in need of urgent treatment for malnutrition, according to the WFP; 19 people died of starvation in a single day on July 20, the Gaza Ministry of Health reported. And worse is yet to come. Michael Fakhri, Pedro Arrojo-Agudo and Francesca Albanese said it a year ago — it is high time for the UN to officially declare that 'famine' is in Gaza. The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera's editorial stance.
The Guardian
16-06-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
Send in armed UN troops to protect aid convoys or risk ‘dystopia', says expert
UN peacekeepers should be routinely deployed to protect aid convoys from attack in places such as Gaza and Sudan, a senior United Nations expert has proposed. With starvation increasingly used as a weapon of war, Michael Fakhri said armed UN troops were now required to ensure that food reached vulnerable populations. 'I'm calling for the UN general assembly to authorise peacekeepers to accompany humanitarian convoys,' said the UN's special rapporteur on the right to food. Fakhri's call for intervention comes amid deepening concern over the increased targeting of aid convoys in Africa and the Middle East. The UN's human rights office said it was 'deeply disturbed' by the rising number of attacks, warning that any attempt to block aid or target humanitarians was a war crime. Recently, humanitarian convoys have been deliberately targeted in Central African Republic and also in Haiti in the Caribbean. Earlier this month, a UN aid convoy of 15 trucks – the first attempt to reach the besieged Sudanese city of El Fasher for a year – was attacked, killing five people. The most high-profile obstruction of aid, however, involves the Gaza Strip. Three months ago, Israel imposed a full humanitarian blockade on Gaza, cutting off food and other critical supplies to the Palestinian territory. Aid convoys entering Gaza have also been repeatedly attacked. Fakhri said that unless there was concerted international intervention to protect aid delivery throughout the world, humanitarian organisations would eventually cease distribution, creating a 'dystopia'. He said the UN security council, which passed a resolution in 2018 condemning the unlawful denial of aid to civilians, had been rendered ineffective because members kept vetoing attempts to help. 'Where the security council is blocked by a veto, the general assembly has the authority to call for peacekeepers,' said Fakhri. He said such a move could happen quickly with a majority vote of the 193 member states required – a proportion that Fakhri predicted would easily be reached. 'What the general assembly would do is politically implement what countries are already obliged to do.' Frustration over the lack of international action to safeguard vital aid supplies – particularly in Gaza – has forced activists to take matters into their own hands. Last week, a yacht attempted to break the Israeli blockade and deliver aid to Gaza but was prevented by Israel. On the same day the boat was intercepted, a land aid convoy set off from Tunisia with the similar intention of breaking Israel's blockade of humanitarian aid for the Palestinian territory. In Africa, aid delivery in Sudan has become increasingly fraught as key routes are blocked or attacked while aid facilities and humanitarian workers have been targeted. Jeremy Laurence, a Geneva-based spokesperson for the UN human rights office, said: 'We are deeply disturbed by the intentional obstruction of aid trying to reach civilians from Gaza to Sudan and elsewhere, including through attacks on aid convoys. 'Worryingly, these practices appear to be on the increase,' Laurence said. 'Wilfully impeding relief supplies to starve civilians as a method of warfare is a war crime.' Meanwhile, Human Rights Watch described as 'horrifying' the spike in the frequency and severity of attacks on humanitarian workers. Louis Charbonneau, United Nations director at HRW, said:'Last year set a grim record for the number of humanitarian workers killed in conflict zones – more than 360 – most of them in Gaza but also in Sudan, Ukraine and elsewhere.' Fakhri added: 'Whoever controls aid has a significant amount of power in a particular region and conflict.' He warned that if attacks continued then traditional aid distributors such as the UN could be forced to give up. 'It makes it less likely for the UN, for the international community, for the Red Cross, for civil society organisations, to do that work and then who will take over? These militarised operations seen in Gaza?' he said. Fakhri was referring to the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a US and Israel-backed logistics group that aims to replace Gaza's UN-led food and humanitarian supply distribution network. Last Wednesday, Israeli forces killed at least 60 Palestinians in Gaza who were seeking food from a GHF distribution centre, with dozens more wounded. Charbonneau urged greater justice for attacks on humanitarians and aid convoys. 'One big motivator is impunity, which emboldens the governments of Israel, Russia, the warring parties in Sudan and others to target or fire indiscriminately at civilians, including humanitarian workers,' he said. 'The problem is they feel confident they can get away with it.'
Al Etihad
03-06-2025
- Politics
- Al Etihad
UN experts call for safe passage of Gaza-bound Freedom Flotilla aid ship
3 June 2025 08:24 GENEVA (WAM) United Nations human rights experts have called for the safe passage of the Freedom Flotilla Coalition vessel, which departed from Italy on Sunday, June 1, carrying essential medical supplies, food, and children's items destined for a statement issued on Monday in Geneva, the experts—including UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, Michael Fakhri, and Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories, Francesca Albanese—emphasised the urgent need for humanitarian aid in expressed grave concern for the safety of those onboard the Freedom Flotilla vessel in light of repeated Israeli attacks on human rights defenders and both UN and civilian humanitarian missions. They recalled a similar vessel launched by the alliance in early May that was targeted by a drone strike off the coast of statement stressed that as the flotilla approaches Palestinian territorial waters off the coast of Gaza, Israel must abide by international law and comply with the International Court of Justice's orders to ensure unimpeded delivery of humanitarian experts highlighted that the ICJ had issued provisional measures in March 2024, recognising the widespread presence of famine and starvation in further condemned the use of humanitarian aid as a weapon of war, stating that the Israeli- and US-backed Gaza Relief Foundation was employing aid to displace, humiliate and detain civilians. The experts also cited alarming figures, noting that acute malnutrition among children had risen by more than 80 percent as of March 2025.
