Hunger, lack of medicine threaten lives of residents of Gaza Strip
GAZA, June 30 (YPA) – Palestinian human rights organizations have raised their voices loudly to warn against the continuation of the Israeli occupation entity restricting the entry of medical and food aid into Gaza City and its north.
The Israeli occupation entity continues to renounce the temporary urgent measures required by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the context of its consideration of the case brought by South Africa, with the aim of deepening the suffering of the Palestinians resulting from the acute and dangerous shortage of medicines and medical equipment, coupled with the policy of starvation and thirst, which has become the approach for more than eight months of continuous genocide.
These organizations confirmed in a press statement that the occupation has been operating since October 7, 2023, without any legal standard and is committing blatant violations of binding international laws and ignoring the decisions of the ICJ.
The Israeli occupation insists on committing the crime of genocide against the residents of the Gaza Strip, after turning their homes into piles of rubble, killing tens of thousands of them, and causing the deliberate collapse of the health system to achieve its political and military goals, using starvation, thirst, and deprivation of medicine as a tool to forcibly displace about 1.9 million Palestinians.
According to the statement, two-thirds of Gaza’s population is now besieged within an area of 69 square kilometers, which constitutes one-fifth of the Strip’s area.
The occupation leaders and elites did not hide their prior intention to use starvation as a weapon, and they were aware of the most important statement by Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Galant that withholding food and water is part of the military operation.
The organizations pointed out that the occupation forces deliberately restricted the efforts of international relief organizations and killed dozens of their workers, which contributed to creating an ongoing hunger crisis that has not stopped in the Strip.
They explained that the inability to provide health services safely, in conjunction with the lack of clean water and the absence of sanitation infrastructure, further exacerbates acute malnutrition and hunger in Gaza.
More than 8,000 children under the age of five have been diagnosed with acute malnutrition, with the security situation hampering efforts to identify cases of malnutrition in children.
UNICEF had warned that nearly 3,000 children who were receiving treatment for acute malnutrition in the southern Gaza Strip had lost access to life-saving services due to their displacement, with their ability to receive treatment diminishing as only two stabilization centers operate for cases of children suffering from acute malnutrition, one in northern Gaza and the other in Deir al-Balah.
YPA