Urgent Warning from WHO: Children Starving in Northern Gaza

Children in northern Gaza are succumbing to hunger, according to the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. WHO's recent visits to Al-Awda and Kamal Adwan hospitals revealed distressing conditions, with 10 children having died from malnutrition. The dire situation is exacerbated by severe shortages of food, fuel, and medical supplies, as well as destroyed hospital infrastructure in the region, home to around 300,000 people enduring scarce resources and contaminated water.

These hospital visits marked WHO's first in several months, despite persistent efforts to gain regular access to northern Gaza. The Gaza health ministry, under Hamas control, reported at least 15 child deaths due to malnutrition and dehydration at Kamal Adwan Hospital. Furthermore, the UN sounded the alarm last week, warning of an impending starvation crisis in Gaza.

Adele Khodr UNICEF's regional director for the Middle East and North Africa, lamented the tragic deaths of children, attributing them to man-made factors that could have been prevented. In response to the crisis, the US initiated an airlift of humanitarian aid into Gaza, delivering over 38,000 food packages. However, aid agencies caution that such deliveries, including previous ones by other countries, are inefficient and sometimes hazardous.

The aid efforts face additional challenges, with Philip Lazzarini, head of the main UN agency in Gaza, accusing the Israeli government of attempting to eradicate the UN presence in the region. Israel has long accused UN entities of bias and anti-Semitism, leading to the suspension of funding by some Western countries to the Palestine Refugee Agency. These charges, according to Lazzarini, serve a broader political agenda aimed at...