French website: Israel uses starvation as a “weapon of war” in Gaza

Paris - The French website Mediapart said that during the past week, about 20 people died of hunger in the northern Gaza Strip, which receives almost no aid. After five months of war, civilians who were left to their own devices became the first victims of the Israeli siege.

A girl died on March 1 in the only children’s hospital in the northern Gaza Strip “due to a lack of food and medicine.” The bottle of milk that the medical team was able to bring her arrived too late. Her sister also died a few days ago in the same hospital. The medical staff helplessly observes this vicious circle. Mothers who suffer from malnutrition during pregnancy accumulate nutritional deficiencies, and when their children are born, they are unable to breastfeed them because they are hungry. Another two-month-old child died at the end of February. He got sick and his immune system was weak, one health care worker said.

About 20 people died of hunger in the northern Gaza Strip, which receives almost no humanitarian aid

According to the Gaza Ministry of Health, twenty Gazans died due to hunger and dehydration . The first deaths were noted at the end of February. The French website indicates that WHO teams observed dangerous levels of malnutrition, children dying of hunger, serious shortages of fuel, food, and medical supplies, and hospitals that were destroyed.

On the podium of the United Nations General Assembly, Palestinian Ambassador Riyad Mansour spoke about another 10-year-old victim. The child died in a hospital in the city of Rafah, south of the Gaza Strip, as he suffered from cerebral palsy, and needed a balanced diet that was impossible to find in the enclave isolated from the world. Even in Rafah, the gateway to food aid, there are no longer fresh fruits and products, and rarely meat, which is traded at exorbitant prices, Mediapart continues.

Israel has besieged the Gaza Strip for five months, where there is no electricity, food, water, or gas, and everything is closed. Starvation is part of the Israeli strategy in the Gaza Strip and is a weapon of war. This goes hand in hand with the genocidal intent that Israel was officially accused of committing before the International Court of Justice, as Mediapart reports on Fida al-Araj, the food security and protection coordinator at the non-governmental organization Oxfam, who was contacted by phone in Rafah, where she is located.

Mediapart continued to explain that agricultural lands have been largely destroyed, and the Gaza port is in ruins. From north to south, everyone is hungry in Gaza. According to the United Nations, a quarter of the population is approaching famine. In the north, where about 300,000 people still live, people feed on tree leaves, cakes made from bird seed or animal feed.

The website referred to the International Court of Justice’s order on January 26, ordering Israel to allow more aid to enter the Strip. But on the contrary, deliveries fell by about two-thirds in February. The Israeli army office responsible for Palestinians in the occupied territories, and particularly responsible for what enters Gaza, places responsibility on humanitarian organizations.

Starvation is part of the Israeli strategy in the Gaza Strip, and it is a weapon of war. This goes hand in hand with the genocidal intent that Israel has been formally accused of committing before the International Court of Justice

Associations and organizations must coordinate their movements with the occupation army, to avoid being targeted by fire, and to move in places where roads are difficult to pass and are largely destroyed. Convoys must also obtain a permit to pass through Israeli checkpoints, especially towards the northern Gaza Strip, and are often delayed, and sometimes forced to return due to not passing in time. The north is isolated from the world, as UNRWA carried out its last distribution operation in Gaza City on January 23, explains Mediapart.

Added to this is the collapse of public order. The civilian authorities in Gaza linked to Hamas withdrew after being targeted by the Israeli army, and were not replaced, as Mediaart explains, explaining that Israel continues its war against United Nations institutions, especially UNRWA, which is the only institution capable of taking over the partial administration of the Gaza Strip. In the north, the part most devastated by the fighting, and without a significant humanitarian presence, civilians are left to their own devices, in a worrying institutional vacuum.

“Mediapart” refers to what happened on February 29, when 118 Palestinians were killed waiting for humanitarian aid, and 780 others were injured, as a result of the Israeli army shooting at them.

From Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, which received more than 200 wounded, the head of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Gaza, Georgios Petropoulos, explained on March 1 that he “saw people with gunshot wounds, amputees and children.” The youngest is twelve years old.”

Palestinians reported that the Israeli army regularly opened fire on crowds during the delivery of humanitarian aid in the northern Gaza Strip. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territories documented “at least 14 incidents that included shooting and bombing” during the distribution of aid in Gaza City. On February 25, at least ten people were killed at the Nabulsi roundabout in Gaza. The High Commissioner for Human Rights recalled that “Israel, as the occupying power, has a duty to ensure the provision of food and medical care to the population, commensurate with their needs.”

The Israeli army regularly fires into crowds during the delivery of humanitarian aid in the northern Gaza Strip, killing dozens

Mediapart continued to clarify that certain countries, including France, carried out airdrops of humanitarian aid in the northern Gaza Strip, considering that the images of these packages being dropped from the sky, and the crowds rushing to try to catch one of them, are images that are particularly insulting to the residents of Gaza. Some of the packages fell into Israeli territory, while others fell into the sea. Also, all these drops are insufficient, and the residents of Gaza want aid that arrives in an organized manner.

Fida al-Araj, food security and protection coordinator at Oxfam, considered that “it is not a humanitarian crisis, but rather an open war,” stressing the need for an immediate ceasefire, and stressing that if the war ends, a humanitarian crisis must still be managed in the Strip.