The Israeli occupation authority’s decision to reject UNRWA food convoys entering northern Gaza will accelerate the risk of famine and send already starving children more quickly to their graves, says aid agency Save the Children.
The ruling, made yesterday, will have detrimental effects on the besieged enclave, the rights group warned.
on 24 March by Israeli authorities United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) food convoys into northern Gaza will
Save the Children Country Director in the occupied Palestinian territory, Xavier Joubert, said: “Further restricting already drip-fed aid into northern Gaza is tantamount to tightening the noose. This announcement shows how funding cuts to the UN agency on which Palestinians and we as humanitarian organisations depend have further emboldened the weaponisation of aid.”
“We heard just last week from the authoritative body on hunger crises – the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification System – that children and families in northern Gaza face the imminent risk of famine, as early as this month. Children are already dying from starvation and disease at the highest pace the world has ever seen, since records began.
According to UN data, the daily average number of aid trucks entering Gaza dropped by more than a third in the weeks following provisional measures from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) which ordered Israel to allow safe, unfettered humanitarian aid access.
Source: Middle East Monitor