According to the UN on Friday, unless the Israel-Hamas conflict changes, famine in the Gaza Strip is all but certain.
Even while conditions in the Palestinian territory have gotten worse since the war began on October 7 with the Hamas strikes on Israel, the UN and other humanitarian organizations have not yet proclaimed a state of hunger in Gaza.
However, according to Jens Laerke, a spokesman for the UN agency OCHA, “once a famine is declared, it is too late for too many people”.
Thousands have already died in the conflict. Hamas militants killed about 1,160 people in Israel on October 7, according to an AFP tally of Israeli figures.
Israel’s retaliatory bombardment and ground offensive in Gaza have killed more than 30,000 people since, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.
Humanitarian agencies say conditions for the 2.2 million people in Gaza are now dire.
“We have to look at what more and more voices, more and more loudly, are saying about the food security situation acros the Gaza Strip, in particular in the north,” said Laerke.
“If something doesn’t change, a famine is almost inevitable on the current trends.”
By the time the official famine in Somalia was announced in 2011, half of the country’s victims had already perished from starvation.
Laerke mentioned the “trickle of trucks” and the almost complete shutdown of commercial food imports.
