Gazan parents fear for children as enclave on brink of famine

Palestinian territory runs risk of famine if Israel continues to blockade food, water and aid, UN has warned

Hana Al Rai, three, who has diabetes, a weakened immune system and malnutrition, rests at Al Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir Al Balah, where she was receiving treatment in June. AP

Live updates: Follow the latest on Israel-Gaza

Gaza's families have described watching their children wither away from hunger or a lack of nutritious food as aid agencies warn of famine risks more than a year into Israel's bombardment of the Palestinian enclave.

Hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of food and medical aid are awaiting permission to enter the Gaza Strip, but Israel, which now controls all entry points, is refusing to allow most aid in. The situation has been exacerbated by Israel's month-long siege on northern Gaza, in which virtually nothing is being allowed into the area.

Only 5,000 tonnes of aid entered Gaza this month, while 94,000 tonnes of food are standing by in Egypt and Jordan amid the severe restrictions by Israel, the World Food Programme said. This could feed one million people for four months, the UN organisation added.

The knock-on effects of surviving on canned and substandard food is far-reaching. Twenty per cent of northern Gaza's children are suffering from what the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) scale calls “wasting”- the most severe form of malnutrition caused by a protracted deprivation of food, water and supplements in children. When children experience wasting, their bodies are frail, weak and more vulnerable to delays in development, complications by illness and susceptible to death, the UN has said.

Mothers such as Inam Wadi, who is living under the Israeli siege in northern Gaza's Beit Lahia, have no choice but to watch their children starve.

“My son Mohammed’s weight keeps dropping day by day. We don’t have a scale to check his exact weight, but it’s clear that he has lost a lot,” she told The National. Mohammed, who is not even two years old, has not had adequate food since the war began, with a brief improvement once flour, fruit and vegetables arrived to the north, Ms Wadi said.

September offered residents of northern Gaza a little reprieve, after lorries carrying chicken, fruits and vegetables, which they had not had in months, were allowed leading to a slight improvement in nutrition.

But with the return of a continuing and intense blockade, Ms Wadi said she has begun to fear for her son's life. Even supplements that could compensate for her son's lack of nutrition cannot be found in hospitals or other places in the north, she said.

Israel's Co-ordinator of the Government Activities in the Territories (Cogat) said that 1,386 lorries have so far entered Gaza since the beginning of the month – just shy of what was needed in the Strip to cover only three days before the war.

At Gaza city's Al Ahli Arab hospital, emergency department nurse Mohammed Al Sheikh says dozens of cases of malnourished children arrive daily with dry and pale faces showing clear symptoms of nutrient deficiency.

“We receive around 20 to 30 cases of malnutrition daily, most of them children aged between one and five,” he said. When the body does not receive the protein, vegetables and fruits it needs, people are often weak and anaemic, and risk collapse, Mr Al Sheikh said.

Hospitals are unable to treat everyone who arrives showing signs of malnutrition due to a lack of supplies, saving vitamins and other supplements for only the most severe cases.

Father of two Mohammed Al Ghazali, further south in Gaza city, said he has been watching his children's health decline right before his eyes. His own health has also been affected by the lack of nutrition.

“If we, as adults, can’t handle this, how are the children and infants supposed to endure canned food? It’s ruining our bodies and destroying the children’s bodies in a heartbreaking way,” he told The National.

Mr Al Ghazali said he had been frantically trying to find anything to help his one-year-old son and three-year-old daughter. “Some pharmacies sell these things, but the prices are extremely high, and I can’t afford them,” he explained.

Mr Al Ghazali lamented the helplessness he feels and the lack of assistance people in northern Gaza have received.

“No one is paying attention,” he said. “Not international organisations nor local ones.”

The lack of food does not only affect children. People with chronic illnesses, like 55 year-old Musa Al Helou in Gaza city, have seen their health deteriorate. To keep his diabetes under control, Mr Al Helou was following a strict diet before the war. He has been unable to maintain this regime under the current conditions.

“Malnutrition is a major problem for someone like me because all the treatments won’t help if there are issues with my diet,” he said. Mr Al Helou said he experiences difficulty walking, often feeling faint and needing to rest after the simplest of activities. What little food is available to him has been more detrimental than beneficial, he says.

“Canned food harms me more than it helps, but I’m forced to eat it because there’s no alternative.”

With Israel on Monday passing a ban on the UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), a lifeline for Palestinians and even aid groups who rely on the well-established organisation for their own supply lines, and aid flow into Gaza still hindered by Israeli authorities, matters are only about to get worse, experts have said.

The IPC predicts there will be an estimated 60,000 cases of acute malnutrition in children between six and 56 months between September 2024 and August 2025 if nothing changes.

“This looming disaster could lead to the loss of countless young lives unless immediate and unhindered humanitarian access is granted to deliver life-saving support. The world must act now to prevent this catastrophe from becoming a full-scale famine,” the UN said in an October statement.