Deputy Executive Director of the United Nations World Food Programme, Carl Skau, said today, Friday, that food supplies to the southern Gaza Strip are at risk, after the Israeli occupation forces expanded the scope of their invasion, adding that “those displaced by the Israeli attack there are facing a public health crisis.”

He said that the situation is currently deteriorating in southern Gaza, despite the worsening severity of hunger and the threat of famine in the northern Gaza Strip during the past months.

“We had built up stocks before the operation in Rafah so that we could feed people, but the stocks started to run out, and we no longer had the same ability to reach the people we needed, which we were used to,” Skaw said after a two-day visit to Gaza.

"This is a displacement crisis that is truly a protection disaster, with the million or so people expelled from Rafah now crammed into a small space along the beach," Skau added.

He continued, "It is hot, and the condition of sanitation facilities is very poor. We were driving through rivers of sewage. It is a public health crisis in the making."

“Despite the increase in food shipments entering northern Gaza, there is a need to provide the population with basic health care, water and sanitation, to completely turn the curve of famine in the north,” Skau said. He added that Israel must allow more health care needs into Gaza.

Skaw said that he was surprised by the level of destruction, and that "the people of Gaza are groaning as a result of this conflict."