More than 1.000 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces since May as they tried to reach food in the Gaza Strip, mostly near aid points run by a US contractor, the United Nations (UN) human rights office said yesterday, the Associated Press (AP) reports.
Meanwhile, Israeli strikes have killed 25 people across Gaza, according to local health officials.
Desperation is growing in Gaza, a Palestinian territory of more than two million people that experts say is at risk of famine due to an Israeli blockade and a nearly two-year offensive. A breakdown in security has led to looting and exacerbated the chaos and violence surrounding aid distribution.
Israel accuses the Palestinian movement Hamas of misappropriating aid - without providing evidence - and blames UN agencies for not delivering food it has allowed to enter.
The military claims it only fired warning shots near aid stations.
The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a US contractor backed by Israel, dismissed the UN's claims as "false and exaggerated statistics".
Gaza's Health Ministry, which is part of the Hamas-run government and staffed by medical experts, said yesterday that 101 people, including 80 children, had recently died of starvation.
The deaths could not be independently confirmed, but UN officials and major international aid organizations say conditions are ripe for a famine in Gaza.
During famine crises, people can die from malnutrition or common diseases and injuries that the body, weakened by hunger, is unable to overcome.
Israel eased a two-and-a-half-month blockade in May, allowing limited aid through a long-standing UN-run system and the newly established GHF. Aid groups say that is nowhere near enough.
"I'm doing this for my children"
Dozens of Palestinians lined up outside a Gaza City soup kitchen yesterday, hoping for a bowl of thin tomato soup. The lucky ones also got a few pieces of eggplant. When supplies ran out, people with pots jostled and stumbled to get to the front of the line.
Nadija Mduh, a pregnant woman who was displaced from her home and now lives in a tent with her husband and three children, said she fears being knocked down or trampled, as well as heatstroke, as daytime temperatures exceed 32 degrees Celsius.
"I'm doing this for my children. This is hunger, there's no bread or flour," she said.
The UN World Food Programme (WFP) says the hunger crisis in Gaza has reached "new and staggering levels of despair".
Ross Smith, the agency's director of emergencies, said on Monday that nearly 100.000 women and children are suffering from severe acute malnutrition, and that a third of Gaza's population has been going without food for days on end.
MedGlobal, a humanitarian organization operating in Gaza, said five children, including a baby just three months old, have died of starvation in the past three days.
"This is a deliberately caused and man-made disaster. These children died because there is not enough food in Gaza, nor enough medicine, including infusion solutions and medical formulas, to save them," said the organization's executive director, Joseph Beliveau.
The organization also said that the food shortage is so severe that even its own employees are suffering from dizziness and headaches.
Aid delivery model under criticism
Of the 1.054 people killed trying to access food since the end of May, 766 were killed on their way to GHF-run points, according to the UN Human Rights Office. The rest died when gunfire erupted around UN convoys or aid distribution sites.
Tamin el-Khitan, a spokesman for the UN Human Rights Office, said the data came from "multiple reliable sources on the ground," including doctors, humanitarian organizations and human rights organizations.
He added that the figures are still being verified in accordance with the office's strict methodology.
Palestinian witnesses and medical workers claim that Israeli forces regularly open fire on crowds of several thousand people moving towards GHF checkpoints. The army claims to be firing only warning shots, while GHF says its armed contractors have only fired a few shots into the air to prevent a stampede.
Attacks on tents with displaced people
Israeli strikes claimed at least 25 lives across Gaza yesterday, local health officials said.
One of the attacks hit tents housing displaced people in the densely populated Shati refugee camp on the Gaza coast, killing at least 12 people, according to Shifa Hospital, which received the victims. The Israeli military said it was not aware of any such attack by its forces. The dead included three women and three children, the hospital's director, Dr. Mohamed Abu Selmiya, told the Associated Press. Another 38 Palestinians were wounded, he added.
The overnight attack, which hit a gathering of Palestinians waiting for trucks carrying humanitarian aid in Gaza, killed eight people, according to hospital sources. At least 118 people were wounded, the Palestinian Red Crescent said.
"A bag of flour covered in blood and death. How long will this humiliation last?" said Mohamed Issam, who was in the crowd and said some people were run over by trucks in the chaos.
The Israeli military did not immediately comment on the attack. Israel blames Hamas for the deaths of Palestinian civilians, saying the militants hide and operate in densely populated areas.
Israel renewed its offensive in March with a surprise bombing campaign after a previous ceasefire ended. Negotiations for a new ceasefire have been ongoing for weeks, despite pressure from United States President Donald Trump.
Hamas-led militants kidnapped 251 people during the October 7 attack and killed about 1.200. Less than half of the 50 hostages still held in Gaza are believed to be alive.
More than 59.000 Palestinians have been killed during the war, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. Their report does not distinguish between combatants and civilians, but it says more than half of the victims were women and children. The UN and other international organizations consider this source the most reliable when it comes to the number of victims.
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