Philippe Lazzarini, general commissioner for the United Nations Rescue and Work Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) said that is what one of his workers told him on Thursday morning.
This comment which gives to think occurs in the middle of the increasingly serious malnutrition for children and adults throughout the Gaza Strip.
“When the malnutrition of children increases, the adaptation mechanisms fail, access to food and care disappears, famine is silently begins to take place,” said Mr. Lazzarini in a tweet.
Bombs are not the only thing that kills
Gaza faces a relentless bombardment for almost three years, but Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, General manager of the World Health Organization (WHO), said to a briefing Wednesday, it is not only the bombs that kill the Palestinians.
Famine is “another killer”.
At least 100 people would have died of hunger, and WHO has documented at least 21 cases of children under the age of five who die from malnutrition.
In addition, Mr. Lazzarini said that one in five children in Gaza City is badly nourished, a number increasing every day that humanitarian aid without hindrance is refused. He said that these children need urgent treatment, but that supplies remain low.
Between early March and mid-May-80 consecutive days-no help was allowed to enter the Gaza Strip, pushing the population on the verge of famine. Although the minimum help has entered since, Tedros stressed that it is not enough.
“Deliveries of food have resumed intermittently, but remain well below what is necessary for the survival of the population,” he said.
A boy in Gaza expects food.
Shelters are no longer safe
Tedros reported that between May 27 on July 21, more than 1,000 people in Gaza had been killed when they were trying to access food.
Many of them have died on or around the sites operated by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a distribution of aid managed by the Americans and to support the Americans who, according to the UN, repeatedly violates the well -established principles of international humanitarian law.
“Parents tell us that their children cry to sleep hunger. Food distribution sites have become places of violence, ”said Tedros.
In addition to risking their lives when looking for a desperately necessary humanitarian assistance, hospitals – which have been systematically targeted, according to Unfpa – are no longer safe shelters.
“Hospitals, which are supposed to be safe shelters, have been regularly attacked and many no longer work,” said Tedros.
He recalled that on Monday, an WHO staff residence, a humanitarian site, had been attacked, the male personnel being stripped and questioned, the women and children forced to flee on foot in the midst of violence and a member of the staff of the WHO held.
“Despite this, WHO and other United Nations agencies remain in Gaza. Our commitment is firm. United Nations agencies should be protected while operating in conflict zones, “said Tedros.
A UNRWA school has become a shelter in Al Bureij, Gaza, resides in the ruins following a missile attack in May 2025.
Front line workers face hunger
In addition to the Gaza Palestinians who are “emaciated, low and at high risk of dying”, humanitarian workers also feel the effects of the sustained lack of supplies.
Most UNRWA The workers survive in a meager bowl of lenses every day, said Mr. Lazzarini, leading many of them to vanish Hunger at work.
“When the guards cannot find enough to eat, the entire humanitarian system collapses,” he said.
Some parents are too hungry to take care of their children, and even those who reach clinics for treatment are often too tired to follow the advice provided.
Lazzarini noted that UNRWA alone has 6,000 food and medical supplies desperately necessary in Jordan and Egypt. He asked that this aid and others were immediately allowed to pass.
“Families no longer face the fall. They break down, unable to survive. Their existence is threatened, “he said. “Allow humanitarian partners to provide without restriction and uninterrupted humanitarian assistance in Gaza.”
Originally published at Almouwatin.com
