More than 1 in 4 people in Gaza are starving because of war, UN says
More than half a million people in Gaza 바카라 게임 웹사이트 a quarter of the population 바카라 게임 웹사이트 are starving, according to a report Thursday by the United Nations and other agencies, highlighting the humanitarian crisis caused by Israel's bombardment and siege on the territory in response to Hamas' Oct. 7 attack.
The extent of the population's hunger eclipsed even the near-famines in Afghanistan and Yemen of recent years, according to figures in the report. The report warned that the risk of famine is 바카라 게임 웹사이트increasing each day,바카라 게임 웹사이트 blaming the hunger on insufficient aid entering Gaza.
바카라 게임 웹사이트It doesn바카라 게임 웹사이트t get any worse,바카라 게임 웹사이트바카라 게임 웹사이트 said Arif Husain, chief economist for the U.N.바카라 게임 웹사이트s World Food Program. 바카라 게임 웹사이트I have never seen something at the scale that is happening in Gaza. And at this speed.바카라 게임 웹사이트
In the video player above: A WFP spokesperson says there is a risk of famine in Gaza if more supply routes are not opened.
Israel says it is in the final stages of clearing out Hamas militants from northern Gaza, but that months of fighting lie ahead in the south.
The war sparked by Hamas바카라 게임 웹사이트 deadly Oct. 7 rampage and hostage-taking in Israel has killed nearly 20,000 Palestinians. Some 1.9 million Gaza residents 바카라 게임 웹사이트 more than 80% of the population 바카라 게임 웹사이트 have been driven from their homes, and many of them are crammed into U.N. shelters.
Video below: Death toll in Gaza continues to rise
The war has also pushed Gaza바카라 게임 웹사이트s health sector into collapse. Only nine of its 36 health facilities are still partially functioning, all located in the south, according to the World Health Organization. On Thursday, WHO relief workers reported 바카라 게임 웹사이트unbearable바카라 게임 웹사이트 scenes in two hospitals they visited in northern Gaza: Bedridden patients with untreated wounds crying out for water, the few remaining doctors and nurses having no supplies, and bodies being lined up in the courtyard.
Bombardment and fighting continued Thursday, and internet and communications that had been knocked out for several days gradually began to return across the territory.
U.N. Security Council members again on a now-watered down Arab-sponsored resolution for a halt in combat to allow for increased aid deliveries. A vote, initially set for Monday, has been delayed each day since then. The United States now supports the resolution, but other council members said that because of the significant changes, they needed to consult their capitals before a vote, which is now expected on Friday.
Other countries support a stronger text in the resolution that would include the now-eliminated call for the urgent suspension of hostilities between Israel and Hamas.
Instead, the wording now calls 바카라 게임 웹사이트for urgent steps to immediately allow safe and unhindered humanitarian access, and also for creating the conditions for a sustainable cessation of hostilities.바카라 게임 웹사이트 The steps are not defined, but diplomats said, if adopted, this would mark the council바카라 게임 웹사이트s first reference to a cessation of hostilities.
Thursday바카라 게임 웹사이트s report from the U.N. on the hunger in Gaza underscored the failure of weeks of U.S. efforts to ensure greater aid reaches Palestinians.
Video below: One quarter of Gaza's population already starving, World Food Program says
At the start of the war, Israel stopped all deliveries of food, water, medicine and fuel into the territory. After U.S. pressure, it allowed a trickle of aid in through Egypt. But U.N. agencies say only 10% of Gaza's food needs has been entering for weeks.
This week, Israel began allowing aid to enter Gaza through its Kerem Shalom crossing, which boosted the number of trucks entering from around 100 a day to around 190 on Wednesday, according to the U.N. But an Israeli strike Thursday morning hit the Palestinian side of the crossing, forcing the U.N. to stop its pickups of aid there, according to Juliette Touma, spokesperson of UNRWA, the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees.
At least four staff members at the crossing were killed, a nearby hospital reported. The Israeli military said it struck militants in the area.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog said Israel has been working to increase its inspection of aid trucks to 300 or 400 a day, and blamed the U.N. for failures in delivery. The amount of aid could triple 바카라 게임 웹사이트if the U.N., instead of complaining all day, would do its job,바카라 게임 웹사이트 he said, without elaborating on what more the U.N. should be doing.
Egypt's Rafah crossing has limited capacity for trucks to cross. U.N. officials say delivery of aid within much of Gaza has become difficult or impossible because of fighting, and more than 130 U.N. personnel have been killed.
The report released Thursday by 23 U.N. and nongovernmental agencies found that the entire population in Gaza is in food crisis, with 576,600 at catastrophic or starvation levels. 바카라 게임 웹사이트It is a situation where pretty much everybody in Gaza is hungry," Husain, the World Food Program economist, said.
바카라 게임 웹사이트People are very, very close to large outbreaks of disease because their immune systems have become so weak because they don바카라 게임 웹사이트t have enough nourishment,바카라 게임 웹사이트 he said.
Hundreds of people lined up Thursday at a soup kitchen in the southern Gaza town of Rafah, waving cups and pots as they waited for soup to be served from huge vats hanging over wood fires. Rafah, by the Egypt border, is one of the few places that receives regular aid deliveries.
Video below: Biden to Israel: 'Be more careful' with civilian lives
Aya Barbakh, who's been displaced by the war, said she comes every day for food.
바카라 게임 웹사이트Let us be in comfort like other people. We see people dying every day, and we want to die like them. We have been insulted and humiliated,바카라 게임 웹사이트 she said.
Mahmoud al-Qishawi, with the American charity Pious Projects that runs the kitchen, said there바카라 게임 웹사이트s no fuel to cook with, so they have to search around the neighborhood for wood to burn. 바카라 게임 웹사이트There바카라 게임 웹사이트s a huge number of families and we don바카라 게임 웹사이트t have food that is enough for them.바카라 게임 웹사이트
Israel has vowed to continue the offensive until it destroys Hamas바카라 게임 웹사이트 military capabilities and returns scores of hostages captured by Palestinian militants during their Oct. 7 rampage. Hamas and other militants killed some 1,200 people that day, mostly civilians, and captured around 240 others.
Hamas fired a barrage of rockets at central Israel Thursday, showing its military capabilities remain formidable. There were no immediate reports of casualties or damage.
The United States has continued to support Israel바카라 게임 웹사이트s campaign while also urging greater efforts to protect civilians. The U.S. wants Israel to shift to more targeted operations aimed at Hamas leaders and the group's tunnel network.
The Health Ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said Tuesday the death toll since the start of the war had risen to more than 19,600. It does not distinguish between civilian and combatant deaths.
On Wednesday, the WHO delivered supplies to Ahli and Shifa hospitals in northern Gaza, where Israeli troops have demolished vast swaths of the city while fighting Hamas militants.
Israeli forces raided a series of health facilities in the north in recent weeks, detaining men for interrogation and expelling others. On Thursday, troops stormed the Palestinian Red Crescent's ambulance center in the Jabaliya refugee camp, taking away paramedics and ambulance crews, the group said.
In some health facilities, patients who are unable to be moved remain, along with a skeleton staff who can do little beyond first aid, according to U.N. and health officials.
Ahli Hospital is 바카라 게임 웹사이트a place where people are waiting to die,바카라 게임 웹사이트 said Sean Casey, a member of the WHO team that visited the two hospitals Wednesday. Five remaining doctors and five nurses along with around 80 patients remain in Ahli, he said.
All of the hospital buildings are damaged except two, where patients are now kept: the orthopedics ward and a church on the grounds, he said, where 바카라 게임 웹사이트patients were crying out in pain, but were also crying out for us to give them water."
Israel바카라 게임 웹사이트s military says 137 of its soldiers have been killed in the Gaza ground offensive. Israel says it has killed some 7,000 militants, without providing evidence. It blames the high number civilian deaths in Gaza on Hamas, saying it uses them as human shields when it fights in residential areas.
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Jeffery reported from Cairo, Barry from Milan, Italy. Associated Press writers Lee Keath in Cairo, Bassem Mroue in Beirut and Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations contributed.