Palestinians in Gaza face starvation, aid organizations warn : NPR
Hidaya, a 31-year-old Palestinian mother, carries her 18-month-old sick son Mohammed al-Mutawaq, who also displays signs of malnutrition, inside their tent at the Al-Shati refugee camp, west of Gaza City, July 24, 2025.
Omar al-Qattaa / AFP via Getty Images
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Omar al-Qattaa / AFP via Getty Images
Hunger and illness continue to track Palestinians from Gaza and assistance organizations warn that children risk the most famine. The latest disastrous warnings come as the Israeli attacks forced the population in an increasingly confined area and the aid deliveries have almost stopped.
In MarchThe collapse of a temporary truce that had started in January marked the start of a new fatal phase of the conflict, while Israel resumed its bombing of Gaza. Despite President Trump’s pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to accept a new ceasefire, negotiations have so far blocked.
The American envoy of the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, went to Italy this week to meet officials from Israel and Qatar to try to negotiate a new ceasefire who would stop the fights that started with October 7, 2023, attacking Israel led by Gaza Fighters of Hamas, who killed nearly 1,200 people. THE January truce was supposed to facilitate the return of the 50 remaining Israeli hostages, less than half of which are still alive.
Thursday, however, Witkoff posted on X That the members of the American team returned from Qatar, which organized the talks, because the Hamas’s response “clearly shows a lack of desire to reach a cease-fire in Gaza”.
Earlier this week, a hundred human rights groups and human rights warned That Gaza risks “mass famine”.
Here is a brief summary of the situation in Gaza, which includes Anas Baba reports from NPR to Gaza City.
How many Gaza Palestinians have been killed since the start of the conflict?
The Gaza Ministry of Health reports that the Israeli forces killed 59,587 people and injured 143,498, including 8,363 deaths since an increase in Israeli strikes, started in March 2025.
Since May, More than 1,000 Palestinians were killed While trying to access food, most of the nearby aid distribution sites led by Gaza Humaninian Foundation supported by the United States and Israeli, according to the United Nations Human Rights Office. The GHF rejected UN figures as “false and exaggerated”.
UNICEF estimates that 17,000 children are among those killed since October 7, 2023, an attack led by Hamas against Israel, with 33,000 other injured. Speaking during a meeting of the United Nations Security Council on July 16, the executive director of UNICEF, Catherine Russell, said The toll is like “a whole class of children killed, every day for almost two years”.
“These children are not fighters,” said Russell. “They are killed and mutilated while aligning vital foods and drugs.”
At the Patient Friends Hospital, a pediatric establishment in Gaza City, few treated infants have the strength to cry. Most are soft in the arms of mothers who cannot provide breast milk because of severe malnutrition.
The nineteen mother, Najah Abu Shihada, brought her young son with her for treatment. At one year, he has the weight of a newborn baby – only 6.5 pounds.
“I sleep hungry and I wake up hungry,” says Shihada. “A single miche of bread costs $ 6; it is barely sufficient for anyone.”
The hospital was forced to suspend his malnutrition treatment program because he no longer has supplies. The patient’s medical director said Salah told NPR that the situation gets worse day by day. “The prognosis is bad that yesterday,” he says, “and tomorrow will be bad that today.”
Philippe Lazzarini, the general commissioner of UNRWA, the United Nations Palestinian Rescue Agency, Posted on X Thursday that “the people of Gaza are neither dead nor alive, they are corpses”: a colleague from #Gaza told me this morning “.
“Most of the children that our teams see are emaciated, low and at high risk of dying if they do not obtain the treatment they need urgent,” wrote Lazzarini, adding: “More than 100 people, the vast majority of them, children, would have died of hunger.”
How much have been moved internally?
The UN said that at least 1.9 million people, around 90% of the Gaza population, are moved internally. “Many have been moved several times, about 10 times or more,” said UNRWA.
Since the fighting intensified in March, Israel ordered to bring out evacuations from the civilians of Gaza. According to the UN, The Army of Israel now controls 88% GazaWith the remaining 12%, the only areas of the territory are always accessible to Palestinian civilians.
Even the Mediterranean coast of Gaza was placed on the limits by the Israeli army.
What access to food and water is there in Gaza?
Gaza’s hunger crisis has reached “new and amazing levels of despair”, ” According to Ross SmithEmergency director of the United Nations Food Program, addressing journalists on Monday.
A third of Palestinians in Gaza go without food for days at a time, said Smith. He said that around 100,000 women and children suffered from acute serious malnutrition in the territory.
OCHA, the United Nations Humanitarian Affairs Office, reports that malnutrition has increased in children under the age of 5 in Gaza. Of more than 56,000 people who were projected, 9% were assessed as “acute malnutrition” in the first two weeks of July, against 6% last month and 2.4% in February. In Gaza City, 16% of 15,000 children suffered from acute malnutrition, quadrupling the percentage of February.
Even before the war, approximately 97% of Gaza’s drinking water was contaminated by the sea, wastewater and runoff and therefore considered dangerous. Since October 2023, Israeli air strikes against critical infrastructure such as wells, desalination units, wastewater pumps, tanks and pipelines have caused the system collapse Human Rights Watch.
How much aid goes in vehicles?
Certain foods are introduced in Gaza by Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), but the aid is distributed at random hours inside the Israeli military zones, where hundreds of Palestinians were killed by Israeli shots when they tried to obtain food.
Shihada, the mother’s mother for patients with patient friends, told NPR that she hadn’t eaten for a week. She says she considered trying to get GHF food, but fears to be shot by Israeli soldiers. The father of his son was killed in December.
The Israeli army claims that Hamas has diverted humanitarian aid and that its soldiers only pulled warning fire near the aid distribution points.
Help organizations say they have trucks with food and supplies awaiting the borders of Gaza but cannot obtain permission from Israeli soldiers to enter. Israel says that help between GHF and reproaches Hamas for hampering help efforts.
Kate Phillips-Barrasso, vice-president of global policy and advocacy in the Mercy Corps, one of the aid groups that warns against famine in Gaza, said to NPR that the territory is “to a precipice” and is “at a point of non-return”.
She said that a bag of flour now costs $ 480 and that her own staff members in Gaza spend a large part of their time trying to find food for themselves and their families.
Emily Feng of NPR contributed to this report by Tel Aviv, Israel.
