The American "Time" magazine published a report prepared by Mallory Muench in which she said that last month, Reham Shaheen's daughter cried all day from hunger, and the crying made her sick, and she fell asleep while waiting to finish cooking the only meal she ate that day.

Since the beginning of the war in Gaza, Shaheen has been stuck in Jordan, far from her home, her husband, and her three children in Gaza. She said: “I spent two days unable to eat, thinking about my daughter, who could not get food.” She says that the family receives flour from the United Nations, but it is not enough to feed 24 people living in the same tent in Rafah, south of Gaza. They struggle to get canned food or goods at the market, where prices have risen tenfold, and they have to wait hours in queues to get what little.

Children and the elderly come to hospitals due to poor nutrition, and lose weight quickly if they are exposed to infection, says Professor Nick Maynard, a senior surgeon at Oxford University Hospital and a leading expert in emergency clinical medicine, in an audio message to the magazine.

But the situation on the ground in Gaza is worse than Maynard described from a distance, with drones whizzing in the background all the time. He says that humanitarian relief organizations have always sounded sirens that Gaza is facing famine. The United Nations said that one in four suffers from hunger, and one in every 9 families in some areas of Gaza spends the day and night without food. In a report published by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, it was estimated that 2 million people in Gaza will face severe levels of food insecurity, and one in four families will face famine-like conditions.

After the Hamas attack on Israel in October, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Galant ordered a total blockade on Gaza: “There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, and everything will stop.”

On October 16, Israeli Energy Minister Israel Katz (now Foreign Minister) said that he opposed lifting the blockade, while National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir said, on October 17, that no aid should enter Gaza as long as the Hostages held by Hamas.

Israel began allowing aid to enter Gaza on October 21, but human rights organizations and legal experts point to these Israeli statements and actions that led to the hunger crisis as evidence of the use of starvation as a weapon in the war on Gaza.

International law covering war stipulates that “the intentional use of starvation of civilians as a means of war, depriving them of materials indispensable for their survival, and deliberately obstructing the access of food supplies” is considered a violation.

Catriona Murdoch of Global Rights Compliance, a leading legal expert who has studied starvation in Syria, South Sudan, Yemen and Ukraine, says that when it comes to Israeli rhetoric, “it's really blatant in terms of declaring their intentions.”

In response to questions from the magazine, Colonel Elad Goren, head of the Civil Department, “Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories,” which supervises the entry of aid into Gaza, said, “The narrative about a siege is not entirely true.” Goren said that Israel provides 28 million liters of water daily to Gaza, has allowed 126,000 tons of aid to enter since the beginning of the war, and this week increased the number of trucks from 70 to 126 trucks.

Goren said: “According to our assessment based on our dialogue with the United Nations and other humanitarian organizations, there are sufficient quantities of food in Gaza, and we will continue to push for humanitarian organizations to obtain more trucks at the border and distribute them. However, we heard voices calling for more support for Gaza.”

He added: “We did not stand, and we will not stand, in the face of distributing humanitarian aid to the people of Gaza, who are not part of terrorism, and they are not our enemies.”

However, Juliette Tohme, Director of Communications at the United Nations Agency UNRWA, told the magazine that the number of trucks, including trucks loaded with commercial goods, had decreased from about 500 trucks, during official work and since the beginning of the war. Adding that there is not enough support. In the last week of December, the United Nations said that food support reached 8% of the population in need.

Jeremy Lawrence, spokesman for the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, told the magazine that, “because of Israeli restrictions, the level of life-saving humanitarian assistance reaching the Gaza Strip is minimal, and far below the survival needs of the civilian population.” “.

Goren said that Israel is prepared to increase what the United Nations receives, and that other groups must increase their capabilities in terms of the number of trucks and workers, extend working hours, improve packaging operations and implement a QR system to track delivery.

The United Nations responded to Israel's accusations that it was responsible for the gap in aid access. In December, Secretary-General António Guterres said that the way Israel is managing the military campaign "created many obstacles." The United Nations said it was unable to deliver aid this week due to “delays and prevention” as well as military operations.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said in an email that support is hampered by security risks and restrictions on movement, including constant inspections and long lines at checkpoints and destroyed streets. The office’s statement said: “Support operations inside Gaza face continuous bombardment, as relief workers have been killed, and some humanitarian convoys have been shot at.”

Tohme said that the Israeli army opened fire on an aid convoy that was heading south between Gaza City and the Nuseirat camp, on December 28. In response to the report, Goren said: “This is a war zone, and we facilitate the entry and movement of many humanitarian organizations, and if there are allegations, we will deal with the information, investigate it, and respond to the agency.” UN officials say a ceasefire and easier, unrestricted passage of commercial goods is necessary to prevent famine.

Some legal experts believe that international laws have been violated, and Human Rights Watch built on statements by Israeli officials and interviews with residents in the Gaza Strip regarding food shortages, and evidence of bombing and destruction of infrastructure and sources, and accused Israel, in a report in December , responsible for starvation as a war crime.

The use of starvation and siege as part of war is not new. It was used in the Biafran War in Nigeria, the siege of Sarajevo in Bosnia, in Syria, and against the Tigray region in Ethiopia.

In an article published by Alex de Waal, director of the World Peace Foundation at Tufts University, he said that the destruction of life-necessary materials in Gaza “exceeds any man-made famine that has occurred in the past 75 years.”

He told De Waal that starvation warnings were issued: “If you do not modify your behavior based on the reactions, you will become responsible because you acted with the knowledge that this would be the result.” Regarding Israel’s actions in Gaza, he replied: “The fact that they continued to launch this attack, knowing the outcome, is reckless and a crime of the second degree, amounting to a crime against humanity according to the legal arguments of scholars.”

Murdoch comments that circumstantial evidence is sufficient to prove starvation as a war crime, and if the information is found and the behavior continues, and that it will lead to starvation of civilians, then the supervisors will be held responsible.

She added that starvation, as a war crime, had never been brought to trial before. But her organization submitted a report in which it argued that it was happening in South Sudan, and she wanted her group to be allowed to conduct an independent investigation in Gaza. The issue could be addressed before the International Court of Justice, which will discuss, next week, the request from South Africa, which mentioned starvation.

But the case may last for years. We will not do much for Shaheen’s family at the present time.

Source: Sama News