Gaza’s doctors describe hunger and fear, as starvation reaches unprecedented levels.
Nine out of ten Palestinians have gone a full day and night with nothing to eat in areas across Gaza, a new report by the World Food Programme (WFP) says.
The WFP also reported that up to 97 percent of Gazans do not have enough food to meet their basic needs amid Israel’s siege and military assault on the Palestinian enclave.
For Gaza’s medical workers, dwindling access to food and water has exacerbated their struggle to cope throughout the crisis, while tackling carrying out life-saving work.
“I will be honest with you, I am very hungry and I have low energy. I have been hungry for a while now. I am currently located in the nursing school at the European Hospital in Gaza at the moment,” a senior clinician from Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP) told The New Arab.
The clinician, who did not wish to identify himself, said that increasing hunger levels have significantly affected him and his children.
He added that he has received the help of humanitarian only once, to which he described having been given “mostly biscuits and canned food.” RELATED
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MENA The New Arab Staff & Agencies
The clinician pointed out that his efforts to secure food are to ensure his children are a priority, adding that he has not “experienced the feeling of being full for weeks”.
“The bombing around my residence caused psychological problems for my children. They are afraid of the dark and the sounds of the bombing are terrifying,” he said.
“My son is five years old and he asks me to get him rice and meat. He doesn’t understand that his father is more hungry than he is.”
On Tuesday, a number of people stormed a warehouse where two days’ worth of food aid had piled up before distribution, the UN Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA) said.
People desperately snatched whatever they could and ran off with sacks of flour.
“The hunger war has started,” said Nawras Abu Libdeh, a medical worker based in Khan Younis with MAP told news agency Associated Press. “And this is the worst of all wars.”
In recent days, Israeli tanks have rumbled into southern Gaza, starting with Khan Younis.
It’s the opening of a grim new chapter in a war in which Israel has already killed 17,487 Palestinians, according to the Palestinian health ministry in Gaza.
Organisations such as Doctors Without Borders have (MSF) issued warnings on the challenges faced, as nonstop heavy shelling, water scarcity and food shortages have prevented their patients from accessing adequate medical care.
Doctors Against Genocide (DAG), a global healthcare coalition, detailed the extremities of dehydration and starvation experienced by their own doctors.
“Collective punishment and starvation have long been tactics of genocide, and accountability for and recognition of these genocidal tactics is an important part of our international institutions,” DAG said in a statement obtained by The New Arab.
