As famine tightens its grip on Gaza, a Palestinian Non-Governmental Organizations Network says the situation is worsening quickly for the tens of thousands of children who are suffering from malnutrition in different areas of Gaza.
“We have no food supplies or supplementary materials or medications for these children,” Amjad Shawa of the NGO network was quoted as saying from Gaza City on Friday.
“So the cases will be complicated and there is high concern that we will witness more casualties in the coming few days,” he added.
Shawa said that “the whole Strip is starving” and the majority of the children in Gaza are suffering from malnutrition.
“Thousands of these children are severe cases,” he stressed, adding: “The health facilities are largely destroyed and out of service. Facilities cannot deal with such a big number of children without medications and supplementary materials.”
Ahmad Najjar, a Press TV correspondent, earlier said in a report from inside Nasser Hospital that medical facilities were overwhelmed with starving children, where malnutrition has turned paediatric wards into scenes of silent suffering.
It has been two months since Israel imposed its longest blockade on the Strip, preventing food, water and medicine from reaching Palestinians in need.
Children have suffered the most, with at least 23 reported to have died from malnutrition and dehydration in recent weeks.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) also on Friday warned the humanitarian response in the besieged Gaza Strip was on the “verge of total collapse.”
“Without an immediate resumption of aid deliveries, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) will not have access to the food, medicines, and life-saving supplies needed to sustain many of its programmes in Gaza,” it said in a statement.
Pascal Hundt, ICRC deputy director of operations, said that civilians in the blockaded Palestinian territory were cut off from nearly all humanitarian assistance
“Civilians in Gaza are facing an overwhelming daily struggle to survive the dangers of hostilities, cope with relentless displacement, and endure the consequences of being deprived of urgent humanitarian assistance.”
“This situation must not – and cannot – be allowed to escalate further.”
The Gaza Government Media Office this week accused Israel of exacerbating Palestinian children's suffering through its ongoing genocide and blockade, which has led to widespread acute malnutrition affecting more than 65,000 hospitalized children out of 1.1 million facing daily hunger.
Israel strictly controls all inflows of international aid vital for the 2.4 million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. It halted aid deliveries to Gaza on March 2, days before it ended a ceasefire that had significantly reduced hostilities after 15 months of war.
Israeli minister of military affairs Israel Katz recently said the regime would not allow any humanitarian aid to enter Gaza, confirming that food is being used as a tool of pressure against Hamas.
Katz said no preparations were being made to bring supplies into the strip.
In March, the Israeli regime's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, banned aid deliveries into Gaza in a move he said was meant to pressure Hamas into accepting an extension of the first stage of the ceasefire deal, which Israel broke.
Every day, thousands of residents in Gaza, including numerous children, flock to community kitchens in search of food to feed their families.
It has been several weeks since Israel has blocked the entry of food, medicine and other critical supplies.
Aid agencies say there are concerns of a full-blown famine taking hold across the blockaded Palestinian territory.
Israel resumed its brutal campaign in the Gaza Strip on March 18, unilaterally breaching a two-month truce.
Gaza's Health Ministry said on Thursday that at least 2,326 people have been killed since Israel resumed strikes.
More than 52,400 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since October 2023, most of them women and children.
Press TV’s website
