Review of Alexandra Stark, “The Yemen Model: Why U.S. Policy Has Failed in the Middle East” (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2024). Munich, Germany (Special to Informed Comment; Feature) –– Yemen goes through a civil war that does not end, frequent cholera outbreaks, and acute malnutrition among children. These days, however, the southern […]
By Tristan Dunning, Macquarie University; Martin Kear, University of Sydney; and Shannon Brincat, University of the Sunshine Coast | – (The Conversation) – While the killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar could have provided an off-ramp for the conflict in Gaza, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ongoing vows of “total victory” make this seem unlikely. […]
How did we end up in a situation where there is increasing talk of an emerging Third World War? A look back at a century in which the arms industry repeatedly found enemy images, along with the appropriate triggers, and in the meantime perfected its arsenal. Time to look at history from the point of […]
UN Experts Say 'Targeted Starvation Campaign' by Israel Has Led to Famine Across Gaza
The starvation of Palestinians in Gaza "is a form of genocidal violence," said 10 rights experts.
While the United Nations still has not formally declared a famine in Gaza after nine months of Israel's near-total blockade on humanitarian aid, 10 top U.N. experts on Tuesday said they have seen enough.
"We declare that Israel's intentional and targeted starvation campaign against the Palestinian people is a form of genocidal violence and has resulted in famine across all of Gaza," said the experts.
Michael Fakhri, special rapporteur on the right to food, was joined in the statement by other experts including Francesca Albanese, special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967, and Paula Gaviria Betancur, special rapporteur on the human rights of internally displaced persons.
They said the recent deaths of three children in various parts of the enclave led the experts, who do not speak on behalf of the United Nations as a whole, to declare a famine has taken hold.
"Fayez Ataya, who was barely six months old, died on May 30, 2024 and 13-year-old Abdulqader Al-Serhi died on June 1, 2024 at the Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir Al-Balah," said the experts. "Nine-year-old Ahmad Abu Reida died on June 3, 2024 in the tent sheltering his displaced family in Al-Mawasi, Khan Younis. All three children died from malnutrition and lack of access to adequate healthcare."
"With the death of these children from starvation despite medical treatment in central Gaza, there is no doubt that famine has spread from northern Gaza into central and southern Gaza," they continued.
At least 34 Palestinians in Gaza—the majority being children—have now died from malnutrition since October, when Israel began its bombardment of the enclave in retaliation for a Hamas-led attack and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant announced there would "be no electricity, no food, no fuel" allowed in to Gaza.
Israeli officials said in response to Tuesday's statement that it has increased the aid allowed into Gaza recently, but hundreds of delivery trucks remain stranded in Egypt and a floating pier built by the U.S. has not significantly improved the humanitarian crisis.
The U.N. experts said that with the first death of a child from malnutrition and dehydration, it should have been considered "irrefutable that famine has taken hold."
"When a two-month-old baby and 10-year-old Yazan Al Kafarneh died of hunger on February 24 and March 4, respectively, this confirmed that famine had struck northern Gaza," they said. "The whole world should have intervened earlier to stop Israel's genocidal starvation campaign and prevented these deaths... Inaction is complicity."
The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, which is backed by the U.N., said last month that Gaza is at high risk for famine and that nearly half a million people were facing "catastrophic" food insecurity, with an extreme lack of food.
In May, Human Rights Watch co-founder Aryeh Neier, who had previously hesitated to say Israel was committing genocide in Gaza, said Israel's "sustained policy of obstructing the movement of humanitarian assistance into the territory" ultimately convinced him that Israeli officials are "engaged in genocide."
In March, the International Court of Justice ordered Israel to ensure its military refrain from violating the Genocide Convention by preventing humanitarian aid from reaching people in Gaza, saying that "the catastrophic living conditions of the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip have deteriorated further" and that "famine is setting in."
A woman named Ghaneyma Joma told Reuters on Monday at a hospital in Khan Younis that she feared her son would soon die of starvation.
"It's distressing to see my child... lying there dying from malnutrition because I cannot provide him with anything due to the war, the closing of crossings, and the contaminated water," she told the outlet.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations called on the U.S. government, the biggest international funder of Israel's military and a persistent defender of its actions in Gaza, to ensure that a cease-fire agreement is reached and that Palestinians receive necessary humanitarian aid.
"The intentional starvation of the Palestinian people in Gaza can only occur with the active complicity of the Biden administration in Israel's campaign of genocide," said Ibrahim Hooper, national communications director for the group. "This complicity must end, and the Palestinian people must be offered a future in which they are free of occupation and can live in dignity."
Fatma Hijazi, the mother of 10-year-old Palestinian boy Mustafa Hijazi, who died due to malnutrition and lack of medication, holds the lifeless body of her child in Deir al-Balah, Gaza on June 14, 2024.
The Conversation asked Hasan Khatib, an expert in genetics and epigenetics, to explain the growing crisis in the Gaza Strip and what history lessons from earlier famines can teach us about the short- and long-term consequences of starvation, malnutrition and food insecurity.
What is food insecurity and how widespread is it in Gaza?
Food insecurity refers to the lack of regular access to safe and nutritious food necessary for normal growth and development and maintaining an active, healthy life. Severe food insecurity is characterized by running out of food and going a day or more without eating, leading to the experience of hunger.
An initiative called the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, or IPC, managed by United Nations bodies and major relief agencies, was established in 2004 to enhance analysis and decision-making on food security and nutrition.
The IPC classification system identifies five distinct phases of food security: 1. Minimal/none; 2. Stressed; 3. Crisis; 4. Emergency; 5. Catastrophe/famine.
The IPC estimates that 96% of the population in Gaza – 2.15 million people – are experiencing high levels of acute food insecurity, classified as IPC Phase 3 or higher.
Due to the destruction of food production and distribution infrastructure, all households skip meals daily, with adults reducing their portions. The IPC projects that by July 2024, half of the population will be classified as being in a famine, experiencing acute malnutrition or death.
As of June 6, 2024, the World Health Organization reported that 32 patients had died from malnutrition and 73 had been admitted because of severe acute malnutrition in Gaza. Malnutrition can weaken the immune system, increasing the risk of serious illness and death, primarily due to infectious diseases.
And as of the same date, the WHO reported 865,157 cases of acute respiratory infections, 485,315 cases of diarrhea, 57,887 cases of skin rashes and 8,538 cases of chickenpox, all of which can be exacerbated by malnutrition.
How do stress and trauma add to hunger?
Strikes by the Israeli forces across the Gaza Strip have resulted in civilian casualties, the destruction of homes and the displacement of over 1.7 million people since October 2023, including many families who had already been displaced multiple times.
The United Nations Children’s Fund estimates that at least 17,000 children have been separated from their parents as of February 2024, and nearly all children in Gaza need mental health and psychological support. Symptoms observed among these children include heightened anxiety levels, loss of appetite, sleep disturbances and panic attacks.
Since Oct. 7, 2023, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency has provided critical psychological support, including psychological first aid, fatigue management sessions and individual and group counseling, to over 650,000 displaced persons, including 400,000 children.
UN Women, an organization focused on gender equality and the empowerment of women, reported that from October 2023 to April 2024, 10,000 Palestinian women in Gaza were killed, resulting in 19,000 children being orphaned. Approximately 50,000 pregnant Palestinian women and 20,000 newborn babies face limited access to health care facilities due to the bombardment of hospitals and health clinics.
In addition, more than 180 women per day are giving birth without pain relief, leading to a 300% increase in miscarriages due to the severe conditions. These dire conditions are causing severe stress and trauma among Palestinian children and women. This combination of stress, trauma and hunger can leave a lasting impact on both the women and their offspring.
What might the consequences be for future generations?
Over the past two decades, extensive research has investigated whether environmental factors such as hunger, stress and trauma can affect future generations that are not directly exposed to them. Pioneering studies of the Dutch famine, which occurred in the Netherlands from 1944 to 1945, found that these types of intergenerational effects were indeed happening.
During the Nazi occupation, food supplies were cut off from the western part of the Netherlands between November 1944 and May 1945, leading to widespread starvation. Decades later, researchers discovered that children and grandchildren of pregnant women exposed to the famine had a higher risk of health problems later in life, including cardiovascular disease, diabetes and other metabolic disorders.
Similarly, the Great Chinese Famine from 1959 to 1961, which resulted in an estimated 15 million to 40 million deaths, is one of the deadliest famines in history. It profoundly affected the physical and mental health, cognition and overall well-being of those exposed to it and their offspring.
Interestingly, our recent research into sheep demonstrated that paternal diet can alter traits such as muscle growth and reproductive characteristics, which can be passed down to two subsequent generations of sheep.
This inheritance of traits is mediated by chemical groups known as epigenetic marks. These epigenetic tags – known as DNA methylation or histone modifications – can originate from external sources, such as diet, or from within our cells. Histones are proteins that help organize and compact the DNA inside our cells.
These changes can control which genes are turned on or off. When exposed to hunger or stress, the epigenetic marks instruct our cells to behave differently, leading to altered traits. Remarkably, some of these epigenetic marks are inherited by offspring, influencing their traits as well.
Stress and trauma have been the focus of extensive research, particularly in understanding how extreme trauma can have biological effects that are transmitted to subsequent generations. Rachel Yehuda, an expert in psychiatry and the neuroscience of trauma, found that experiencing captivity or detention during the Holocaust was linked to elevated levels of epigenetic marks in a gene called FKBP5, which is involved in stress regulation. These epigenetic alterations were also observed in the children of Holocaust survivors.
Epigenetic changes can be reversible
Research shows that lifestyle and environmental factors play a significant role in influencing epigenetic marks. So positive changes in these areas can lead to the reversal of some of these epigenetic shifts.
One study showed that stress responses in adult rats that are programmed early in life can be reversed later in life. The researchers supplemented methionine, a methyl group donor that alters DNA methylation, to adult rats and observed that the stress response caused by maternal behavior in early life can be reversed in adult life.
I see an urgent need for the medical and scientific community to investigate the potential long-term impacts of current trauma and hunger on vulnerable populations in Gaza, particularly pregnant women and children. Notably, some of the epigenetic marks responsible for these long-term effects of trauma and hunger are reversible when conditions improve.
The Conversation is an independent, not-for-profit media outlet that works with academic experts in their fields to publish short, clear essays on hot topics.
'Visible Signs of Wasting': Heat, Forced Malnutrition Strangle People of Gaza
"Nothing changed," said journalist Bisan Owda. "The Israeli army is still committing the same massacres using starvation in the north and the south."
Humanitarian officials at the United Nations warned Wednesday evening that with Israel continuing to block aid deliveries across Gaza, thousands of children are among those facing acute malnutrition as extreme summer heat exacerbates suffering in the besieged enclave.
The Site Management Working Group for the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) released its latest report on the humanitarian situation in Gaza, noting that aid deliveries in recent days have done little to improve the condition of a population that has been under attack by the U.S.-backed Israeli military—and facing an illegal blockade—for more than eight months.
OCHA said its workers have seen "visible signs of wasting among children"—the most dangerous form of malnutrition, which causes a child to be too thin for their height and results from rapid weight loss.
"No nutrition screenings have been conducted to assess the scale of malnutrition and treat identified cases due to limited capacity," reported OCHA.
Last week, the World Health Organization reported that more than 8,000 children have been diagnosed with and treated for acute malnutrition, including 1,600 with severe wasting.
Health officials have counted at least 32 deaths from malnutrition in Gaza, including 28 among children under the age of five. At least 37,431 Palestinians have been reported killed in the enclave since October, but with hospitals, emergency services, and communications systems largely inoperable due to relentless attacks by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), the official death tolls from starvation and other causes are likely significant undercounts.
OCHA reported that at displacement sites like Deir el-Balah, Khan Younis, and Al Mawasi, where hundreds of thousands of internally displaced people are "living in overcrowded makeshift shelters and tents" with no protection from extreme heat, medical facilities are operating for only a few hours per day and have shortages of medicines.
"Unaffordable transportation and the lack of ambulance services hamper access to partially functioning hospitals, with reports of emergency deliveries taking place in tents with no medical support at late hours during the night," the agency reported.
At Al Jazeera on Thursday, correspondent Hani Mahmoud provided a dispatch from Deir el-Balah, where reporters entered Al-Aqsa Hospital—the only remaining hospital with any functionality in central Gaza:
We spoke to medical staff who described the outbreak of diseases as "alien." The diseases are spreading among displaced people due to their poor living conditions, contaminated water, lack of sanitation and hygiene, and the rising heat. The Israeli military destroyed the vast majority of Gaza's sanitation facilities. It's easy to walk along any of the roads here and see sewage. This is all aggravating the spread of diseases, particularly infectious diseases among women, children, and those who have health complications. Inside Al-Aqsa Hospital, there is unanimous agreement that it is not a hospital any more. It's not suitable for medical services, it's not suitable to save lives.
Pediatric surgeon Jamal Mari, who has been working at one of Deir el-Balah's destroyed hospitals, Al-Ahli, on a medical aid mission from Australia, toldAl Jazeera he encountered a facility with "zero supplies," and was barred from bringing any of his own medical equipment to provide care.
"Whatever disposables we have, we keep reusing and reusing them, which is not safe at all," said Mari. "They've got five rooms which they say are operating theaters, but honestly they're just little cubicles re-fashioned and done as theaters... I don't understand how they're managing."
Deir el-Balah was the site of overnight Israeli air strikes on Thursday, as was the Nuseirat refuguee camp. At least three people were killed and more than a dozen were injured, while the IDF increased its attacks on the southern city of Rafah, where more than 900,000 people have already fled since Israel launched a full-scale attack in May.
The U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) reported on Wednesday that since October 7, when the IDF began its bombardment of Gaza in retaliation for a Hamas-led attack on southern Israel, 67% of water sanitation facilities and infrastructure have been destroyed or damaged.
In addition to starvation, UNRWA said, "as infectious diseases continue to spread and temperatures rise, the lack of hygiene and dehydration pose a severe threat to the health of people across Gaza."
OCHA's report on Wednesday noted that "access constraints continue to severely undermine the delivery of essential humanitarian assistance and services across Gaza, including the delivery of food and nutrition assistance, medical care, protection and shelter support, and water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) services to hundreds of thousands of people."
Between June 1-18, Israeli authorities facilitated 46% of humanitarian assistance missions to northern Gaza. But more than half were either impeded, denied access, or canceled.
Planned transfers of hygiene kits, water deliveries, and waste removals were among the missions that were denied access, and dozens of humanitarian missions were also canceled and impeded in southern Gaza over the same time period.
Carl Skau, deputy executive director of the World Food Program, described the sabotage of the agency's aid efforts.
"Staff spend five to eight hours waiting at checkpoints every day," he said. "Missiles hit our premises, despite being deconflicted."
On social media, Palestinian journalist Bisan Owda posted a video on Wednesday saying that although some aid deliveries have been granted access by Israeli authorities in recent days, Palestinians are still "starving to death."
"Nothing changed," said Owda. "The Israeli army is still committing the same massacres using starvation in the north and the south, because simply, the air drops are not enough... They are trying to kill the people of Gaza by starvation."
A Palestinian child suffering from malnutrition receives treatment with limited facilities at the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah, Gaza on June 1, 2024.
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The United Nations has added Israel to its blacklist of nations that commit harms against children. It joins Russia, DR Congo, South Sudan, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Yemen, and Myanmar. Non-state actors in this category include ISIL, the Taliban, and the Lord’s Resistance Army. Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad have been added to this category this year as well, especially for their attacks on Israeli children on October 7, 2023.
In 26 conflicts throughout the world, the United Nations counted almost 33,000 grave violations against more than 22,500 children.
Israel and the Palestinian Occupied Territories witnessed an alarming rise in violations against children. As bad as the situation was there, it was even worse in Sudan.
Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad were responsible for killing 43 Israeli children on Oct. 7, by live fire, or by rockets and other means. Militant Palestinian groups also killed or maimed Israeli children in the Occupied West Bank, East Jerusalem and northern Israel. Some three thousand cases of alleged injuries to Israeli children have yet to be verified.
The report says that for 2023, the UN verified 3,029 Israeli violations against children in Gaza, and over 4,800 in the Occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem. About 5,698 of these violations were committed by the Israeli armed and security forces.
Last year, Israel detained 906 Palestinian children, mostly in the Palestinian West Bank and East Jerusalem. Some remained imprisoned without charge at the end of the year. In some instances, the Israelis attempted to turn minors into informants.
Among the most alarming sentences in the report is that “the United Nations received reports of the detention of Palestinian children in the Gaza Strip, compounded by multiple forms of sexual violence.”
My lord.
The Israeli Security Forces killed thousands of children in the Gaza Strip with explosive weapons: “Some 19,887 Palestinian children were reported killed or maimed and the reports are pending verification.”
The UN was able to verify that another 1,975 children were maimed, including 166 girls, mainly in the Palestinian West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Some 10,787 children in Gaza were reported maimed by Israeli forces, but the verification process is ongoing.
Harms to children included not only bodily harm but also on schools and hospitals serving children, as well as on teachers and physicians. Some 340 such attacks were carried out by Israeli security forces, 45 on schools and 326 on hospitals. Some 106 teachers, physicians or other staff in schools and pediatric clinics and hospitals were harmed by Israeli troops.
The report says, “A total of 3,227 permit applications (1,895 for boys, 1,332 for girls) to Israeli authorities for children to exit the Gaza Strip through the Erez crossing point, or from the occupied West Bank, to gain access to specialized medical treatment were denied or not approved in time to reach scheduled hospital appointments.” This number represented about 18% of such applications, so almost a fifth were turned down. Of course, in the last quarter of 2023, children in Gaza with medical conditions needing outside treatment were simply trapped, and many have died of cancer or kidney disease, etc.
The report adds, that in Israel’s war on Gaza, “all critical infrastructure, facilities and services have been attacked, including shelter sites, United Nations installations, schools, hospitals, water and sanitation facilities, grain mills and bakeries.”
As a result of lack of electricity and lack of these destroyed facilities, “Children are at risk of famine, severe malnutrition and preventable death.”
In fact, the UN just reported that 8,000 Palestinian children in Gaza have been diagnosed with malnutrition.
The report is also scathing about the crimes against Israeli children commited by Hamas’ Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades and Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s Al-Quds Brigades. But they also harmed Palestinian children and last year they “organized ‘summer camps,’ including for children, exposing them to military content and activities.”
The UN called for all sides to release child hostages and to abide by the laws of war in avoiding harm to innocent children in the prosecution of their war aims.
Munich, Germany (Special to Informed Comment; Feature) –– Pegasus, the main cyber-surveillance weapon developed by the Israeli company NSO Group, had been at the center of formidable reporting before July 2021. Still, the revelations presented by the Pegasus Project partners in a cascade of articles that began on July 18, 2021, represented a watershed moment. […]
Human Rights Watch – (Beirut) – Israel’s widespread use of white phosphorus in south Lebanon is putting civilians at grave risk and contributing to civilian displacement, Human Rights Watch said today. Human Rights Watch verified the use of white phosphorus munitions by Israeli forces in at least 17 municipalities across south Lebanon since October 2023, including 5 […]
By Wafa Aludaini | – ( Middle East Monitor ) – Two Palestinian children died last week of starvation, dehydration and lack of medicine amid desperate conditions in the southern areas of the besieged Gaza Strip. The Ministry of Health announced the death of Abdulqader Sirhi, 13, and seven-month-old Fayiz Abu Ataya, from malnutrition and […]
INVITING AN INDCTED FELON TO SPEAK TO CONGRESS DEFINES MORAL DECAY OF THE US!
Displaying Photos of Kids Starved by Israel, Sanders Explains Boycott of Netanyahu Speech
Children are dying of malnutrition in Gaza as a "direct result of Netanyahu's policies," the Vermont senator said in a speech on the Senate floor.
Sen. Bernie Sanders displayed photos of starving Palestinian children on the floor of the U.S. Senate on Monday to explain his decision to boycott an upcoming speech by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whom Democratic and Republican leaders formally invited to address a joint meeting of Congress amid Israel's catastrophic assault on Gaza.
The monthslong military campaign has had appalling impacts on Palestinian children, Sanders (I-Vt.) emphasized in his floor remarks Monday, blasting U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) for eating "fine steaks" at fundraising dinners with his "billionaire friends" while Israel's army blocks critical food aid from entering Gaza, causing kids to starve to death.
"This is a photograph of a child in Gaza taken by Getty," said the Vermont senator as an aide displayed a picture of an emaciated Palestinian child.
The photo was one of several that Sanders showed during his speech, stressing that there are thousands of children in Gaza suffering acute malnutrition as a "direct result of Netanyahu's policies—Netanyahu, the man Speaker Johnson has invited to address Congress."
"No," Sanders said, "I will not be in attendance for that speech."
Watch Sanders' remarks in full:
Sanders is one of many progressive U.S. lawmakers expected to boycott Netanyahu's speech to Congress, the timing of which remains unclear after the Israeli prime minister's office denied reporting by Punchbowl and other outlets that the date was set for June 13—a day U.S. President Joe Biden is scheduled to be out of the country.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), chair of the roughly 100-member Congressional Progressive Caucus, toldAxios on Monday that she expects the boycott of Netanyahu's speech to be "large," noting there are "a lot of people who are extremely upset he is coming here."
According to Axios, "Jayapal said she has spoken to several lawmakers who went to Netanyahu's 2015 speech [to Congress] but said they will not attend this time."
Speaking to reporters at the U.S. Capitol on Tuesday, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) signaled that she would join the congressional boycott, saying the Israeli prime minister "shouldn't be here."
"I don't think that it is productive for a Republican or a Democrat to invite him," she added.
Netanyahu stands accused by the International Criminal Court of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza Strip, including the "starvation of civilians as a method of warfare" and "willfully causing great suffering." Last month, the ICC's prosecutor formally applied for arrest warrants against Netanyahu and Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, as well as several Hamas leaders.
Whatever the date of his speech to the U.S. Congress, protests are expected to greet the prime minister upon his arrival in Washington, D.C.
"He's an indicted felon in Israel with an indictment as a war criminal at the ICC and they've invited him to speak here! Shame," James Zogby, founder of the Arab American Institute, said of Netanyahu late Monday.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) delivers a speech on June 3, 2024 explaining why he will boycott Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's expected speech before Congress.
Biden Claims Israel Isn't Starving Gazans. Rights Groups Say 'It Is Clear as Day'
"The fact that Israel is using starvation as a weapon of war in Gaza is not in contention," said a Human Rights Watch researcher.
U.S. President Joe Biden said in an interview published Tuesday that he does not believe the Israeli government is using starvation as a weapon of warfare in Gaza, contradicting the findings of leading human rights organizations that have documented Israel's deliberate obstruction of food aid as Palestinians die of malnutrition.
"No, I don't think that," Biden said in response to TIME magazine's Washington bureau chief Massimo Calabresi and editor-in-chief Sam Jacobs, who noted some have "alleged that Israel is intentionally using starvation of civilians as a method of warfare."
The president, who has approved more than 100 arms sales to Israel during its eight-month assault on the Gaza Strip, acknowledged that Israel's military has "engaged in activity that is inappropriate" and that "Palestinians have suffered greatly."
But he stopped well short of the conclusions reached by Oxfam International, Human Rights Watch (HRW), and the International Criminal Court, which recently applied for arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for their role in the "starvation of civilians as a method of warfare" and other war crimes.
The U.S. Agency for International Development has also determined that Israel has unlawfully impeded the delivery of humanitarian assistance to Gaza, leading to a "deterioration of food security and nutrition in Gaza [that] is unprecedented in modern history."
"The fact that Israel is using starvation as a weapon of war in Gaza is not in contention. It is clear as day," Hiba Zayadin, a researcher at HRW, wrote in response to Biden's TIME interview, pointing to her group's December report that found the Israeli military was "deliberately blocking the delivery of water, food, and fuel, while willfully impeding humanitarian assistance, apparently razing agricultural areas, and depriving the civilian population of objects indispensable to their survival."
"The evidence is even stronger today," Zayadin added, citing HRW's April report that focused specifically on the Israeli military's starvation of Gaza children. Dozens of Palestinian kids, some just months old, have died of malnutrition since October, a figure that is almost certain to grow as Israel's bombing campaign and ground offensive in Rafah continue.
The World Food Program said Wednesday that unless Israel's assault on Gaza ends and desperately needed humanitarian aid is allowed to flow, more than a million people in the occupied enclave "are expected to face death and starvation... by mid-July."
Humanitarian groups and experts—including an outspoken former U.S. State Department official—have argued that by continuing to arm Israel and provide it with diplomatic cover on the world stage, the Biden administration is complicit in Gaza's increasingly dire hunger crisis.
"This is not just turning a blind eye to the man-made starvation of an entire population, it is direct complicity," Josh Paul, who resigned from the State Department in October over the administration's support for Israel's assault on Gaza, toldThe Independent last month.
In a speech on the floor of the U.S. Senate earlier this week, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) displayed photos of emaciated children as he explained his decision to boycott Netanyahu's upcoming speech to Congress.
"Blocking humanitarian aid and creating the conditions for famine is not only an act of extreme cruelty—using starvation as an act of war—but it is a violation of both American and international law," Sanders added. "It is a war crime."
Palestinians wait in line to receive food distributed by charitable organizations amid Israeli attacks in Deir Al-Balah, Gaza on May 28, 2024.
