The number of malnourished children in the Gaza Strip has tripled since March, according to the United Nations, as Israel’s months-long blockade pushes the enclave deeper into famine.
Nearly one-third of children in Gaza City are now malnourished, Philippe Lazzarini, head of the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), said Wednesday on X. The figure is six times higher than before the end of a short-lived cease-fire in March.
“This is not a natural disaster. It is a man-made, preventable starvation,” Lazzarini said.
The UNRWA figures are based on a study of nearly 100,000 children under the age of 5. The agency and other aid groups have been unable to deliver supplies to Gaza for nearly six months, despite warehouses in Egypt and Jordan holding enough food to send 6,000 trucks with provisions sufficient for three months.
In July, UNRWA reported that 10% of children examined in its clinics were malnourished. The situation has deteriorated sharply since then, with international pressure mounting on Israel to allow full and safe aid access into the besieged territory.
Aid drops by foreign militaries, including 154 pallets on Wednesday, have drawn criticism from the World Food Programme and others who stress that airdrops are costly, inefficient and incapable of meeting the scale of Gaza’s humanitarian needs.
More than 62,000 Palestinians, most of them women and children, have been killed since Israel launched its war on Gaza in October 2023, according to local health authorities. U.N. experts and rights groups have warned that Israel’s actions amount to collective punishment and could constitute genocide, as famine, disease and displacement engulf the enclave.
