In an overcrowded clinic in central Gaza’s Nuseirat refugee camp, Samar Abu Ajwah clutched her frail newborn as he burst into weak sobs.
Eyad has been diagnosed as malnourished, weighing only 1.9kg (4.2lb). “He needs milk, and we are appealing for help from people who can afford it because we cannot,” Abu Ajwah, who also suffers from malnutrition caused by Israel’s punishing blockade of humanitarian aid, told Al Jazeera.
Ameera Tafesh brought Ru’a, her emaciated six-month-old, to the clinic hoping to find nourishment. “I breastfed her when she was born, but it lasted only a week because I couldn’t produce enough milk,” she told Al Jazeera. “I need to feed her formula, but it’s not available.”
Al Jazeera’s Hind Khoudary, reporting from Nuseirat, said mothers are desperate to find food to feed their children and themselves amid Israeli-induced starvation in the enclave.
Since Israel unilaterally broke a ceasefire in March, it has prevented the distribution of food and other aid through the United Nations and humanitarian agencies, instead setting up a handful of aid distribution sites controlled by its army, backed by the United States and operated by the US-based agency GHF.
Israeli soldiers and GHF security contractors have opened fire on aid seekers at the sites, killing more than 2,200 Palestinians and injuring more than 16,225 since the GHF began operations in late May, the Gaza Ministry of Health reported.
UN agencies have called the system “an abomination” and “a death trap” and repeatedly asked Israel to be allowed to resume their own distributions.
A global hunger monitor, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) initiative, confirmed this month that famine is occurring in the northern part of the Strip and said it is projected to spread to central and southern areas by the end of September.
By then, almost a third of the population of Gaza – nearly 641,000 people – are expected to face catastrophic conditions.
Women, newborns at acute risk
The IPC analysis warned that pregnant women and newborns are at acute risk of starvation. An estimated 55,500 pregnant and breastfeeding women are suffering from malnutrition and require an urgent nutritional response, according to its report.
It added that at least 132,000 children under the age of five will be at risk of death from acute malnutrition by June.
According to Gaza’s Health Ministry, 339 people so far during the war have died due to famine and malnutrition, including 124 children.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres described famine in Gaza as a “man-made disaster, a moral indictment and a failure of humanity itself.”
Israel does not accept that there is widespread malnutrition among Palestinians in Gaza and has disputed fatality figures.
The UN Population Fund, the UN’s sexual and reproductive health agency, said mothers in Gaza were being “forced to give birth while malnourished, exhausted and at heightened risk of death”.
“It means their babies are born too small, too weak or too early to survive. It means mothers unable to breastfeed because they, too, are starving,” the agency said in a statement.
“No woman should be forced to give birth in famine conditions. No child should begin life starving. Every day of inaction condemns more mothers and newborns to suffering.”
UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell repeatedly warned of “unmistakable” signs of spreading malnutrition: “children with wasted bodies, too weak to cry or eat; babies dying from hunger and preventable disease; parents arriving at clinics with nothing to feed their children”.
“There is no time to lose. Without an immediate ceasefire and full humanitarian access, famine will spread, and more children will die,” she said.
