UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Tom Fletcher warned on Tuesday morning that as many as 14,000 babies could die in Gaza within 48 hours if the siege of the war-torn territory continues.
Fletcher said: ‘Five trucks went in on Monday and that’s a drop in the ocean. And let’s be clear, those five trucks are just sat on the other side of the border right now. They’ve not reached the community they need to reach.
‘And let me describe what’s on those trucks, it’s baby food, baby nutrician. There are 14,000 babies that will die in the next 48 hours unless we can reach them. This not food that Hamas is going to steal. We run the risk of looting. We run the risk of being hit as part of the Israeli military offensive. We run all sorts of risks trying to get that baby food through to those mothers who cannot feed their children right now because they’re malnourished.
‘We’ve got to keep on getting as much aid through our mechanism as we can. We can do it at scale. We did it during the ceasefire – 42 days, 600 trucks, 700 trucks, dwarfing anything they are talking about doing through this dodgy modality. We know how to do this. We can do it in line with humanitarian principles and the world, the international community, the donors who provided that aid, are very, very clear with us that this is the only way to do it.
‘To go with the other modality would actually be to support the objectives of the military offensive and to further dehumanise and humiliate those civilians who badly need that aid.
‘We’ve got to get the aid in ourselves. We’ve got, we reckon, clearance for 100 or so trucks to go through today, I hope. Now, it will be very tough. We get impeded at every point, but we’ll load them up with that baby food and our people will run those risks.
‘I’ve been talking to them this morning, they are incredibly, incredibly courageous. They know what’s lying ahead of them – looting, insecurity, the war overhead, the war all around them.
‘But people inside Gaza are so desperate right now and we will do whatever we can to get to them.
‘We are assisting, we will carry on assisting with all our partners and you’ve heard those strong voices raised across the international community that we have unimpeded aid.
‘We know how to do this, we’ve got the people inside and so we’ll keep trying and I think you’ll hear those voices across the international community in support of what we’re doing.’
The humanitarian crisis in Gaza has escalated dramatically since March 18 because the Israeli regime has severely restricted the entry of food, fuel, medicine, and water into the territory.
According to the UN-backed Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), Gaza suffers from phase 5 famine, and nearly 71,000 children under the age of five are at risk of acute malnutrition.
IPC defines phase 5 famine as when at least one in five households experience an extreme lack of food and face starvation, resulting in destitution, extremely critical levels of acute malnutrition, and death.
International pressure on the Israeli regime to de-escalate the intensity of the blockade has increased in recent weeks.
On Monday, Canada, France, and the UK said that unless the Israeli regime lets humanitarian aid enter Gaza and halts its genocidal attacks on the enclave, they will take ‘concrete actions’ against the regime.
Furthermore, 22 countries have signed a joint statement and demanded that the regime allow the resumption of impartial humanitarian operations in the region.
As a result, the regime’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, indicated that he would ease the catastrophic blockade.
He has said that the regime must prevent a ‘starvation crisis’ in Gaza for ‘diplomatic reasons’.
Despite these facts, the Israeli regime increased the number of its air strikes across Gaza, with at least 60 people, mostly children and women, killed on Monday and at least 300 killed over the previous three days.
The UN also issued a warning that the people of Gaza have been losing their lives to preventable diseases due to the extreme scarcity of medicine and the regime’s attacks on hospitals.
The United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, Michael Fakhri, stated that the areas designated by Israel for food distribution in Gaza are politically motivated rather than humanitarian, asserting that Israel is conducting a starvation campaign targeting children in Gaza.
Fakhri said that Israel is committing ethnic cleansing in Gaza and is deliberately starving more than two million Palestinians in the besieged Strip.
He warned that Gaza requires the entry of at least 1,000 trucks per day to meet basic humanitarian needs – a stark contrast to the number of trucks allowed in by Israel on Monday and Tuesday.
Israel announced on Monday that it had permitted the first convoy of humanitarian aid trucks to enter Gaza since 2 March, but the United Nations described the nine food trucks allowed in as ‘a drop in the ocean.’
Fakhri stated: ‘If Israel truly cared about the children of Gaza, it would not be conducting a campaign of starvation against them.’
Mohammed Abu Salmiya, Director of Al-Shifa Medical Complex, stated that hospitals in the northern Gaza Strip are now entirely out of service.
There is no medical facility operating at full capacity across the region, despite the continuous and increasing number of wounded and injured people arriving – on a daily, even momentary, basis.
Abu Salmiya added in a statement that the occupation army has destroyed a significant portion of the Strip’s hospitals since the beginning of the war.
In recent days, it has completed what it began by targeting the remaining ones, in the absence of any protection for healthcare facilities and medical personnel.
Abu Salmiya pointed out that dozens of cancer patients are dying daily due to the inability to receive treatment – either because hospitals have been destroyed or because of severe shortages in medicines and medical supplies – affirming that the situation has become catastrophic by all measures.
He noted that the attacks have not been limited to hospitals and health centres, but have also targeted medicine warehouses, describing it as a ‘systematic campaign’ to dismantle the entire healthcare system in Gaza and strip civilians of their right to treatment and survival.
The Indonesian Hospital has completely gone out of service after the Israeli occupation army intensified its siege on the facility, preventing the arrival of patients, medical staff, and supplies, all under heavy fire cover.
Most hospitals in Gaza and the northern Strip are now out of service amid the systematic destruction of the healthcare system and the lack of alternatives, as the number of injured and sick continues to rise daily.
There is a complete shortage of medical supplies and medications, while some remaining health centres operate with limited capacity and under extremely harsh humanitarian conditions.
Israel continues to directly target medical facilities, storm hospitals, and arrest medical staff and patients in blatant violation of all international laws.
Officials in the Ministry of Health hold Israel and the international community fully responsible for the collapse of the health system in Gaza.
Meanwhile, 23 countries, alongside senior EU officials, issued a joint statement urging Israel to resume the entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza immediately, warning of the growing risk of famine and criticising Israel’s current aid distribution plans.
On the same day, the leaders of France, the United Kingdom, and Canada issued a joint warning, threatening to take action against Israel if it does not end its ongoing genocidal war on Gaza, which has continued since 7 October 2023.
In their statement, the leaders described the level of human suffering in Gaza as unbearable, adding that Israel’s decision to allow in a minimal quantity of food was entirely insufficient.
Their statement followed an announcement from the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, confirming approval of aid entry based on military recommendations, ostensibly to expand the military operation.
The World Food Programme (WFP) said that food security assessments in Gaza show the region is in a race against time to avoid famine, calling on the international community to urgently act to resume the flow of aid.
Alongside the tightened blockade and border closures, Israel continues to carry out round-the-clock aerial and artillery strikes on residential neighbourhoods and civilian infrastructure, resulting in significant daily civilian casualties.
On Sunday, Israel announced the launch of a new military operation in Gaza dubbed ‘Gideon’s Chariots’, which reportedly includes plans for full military occupation of the territory, even as ceasefire negotiations in Doha entered what had been described as a critical stage.
