logo
Aid groups warn of starvation in Gaza as deadly Israeli strikes continue

Aid groups warn of starvation in Gaza as deadly Israeli strikes continue

BreakingNews.ie5 days ago
More than 100 charity and human rights groups have said that Israel's blockade and ongoing military offensive are pushing Palestinians in the Gaza Strip towards starvation.
The organisations raised their concerns as Israeli strikes killed another 21 people overnight, according to local health officials.
Advertisement
Meanwhile, the US administration's Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, was set to meet with a senior Israeli official about ceasefire talks, a sign that lower-level negotiations that have dragged on for weeks could be approaching a breakthrough.
Experts say Gaza is at risk of famine because of Israel's blockade and offensive, launched in response to Hamas's attack on October 7 2023. Israel says it allows enough aid into the territory and faults delivery efforts by UN agencies, which say they are hindered by Israeli restrictions and the breakdown of security.
People in
#Gaza
, including UNRWA staff, are fainting due to starvation and severe hunger.
People including children are dying from severe malnutrition.
People are being starved.
UNRWA alone has thousands of trucks in neighbouring countries waiting to enter Gaza – banned by…
pic.twitter.com/02h3MMD4pd
— UNRWA (@UNRWA)
July 23, 2025
Hamas has said it will only release the remaining 50 hostages it holds, around 20 of them believed to be alive, in exchange for a lasting ceasefire and an Israeli withdrawal, while Israel has vowed to recover all the captives and continue the war until Hamas has been defeated or disarmed.
In an open letter, 115 organisations, including major international aid groups such as Doctors Without Borders, Mercy Corps and Save the Children, said they were watching their own colleagues, as well as the Palestinians they serve, 'waste away'.
Advertisement
It blamed Israeli restrictions and 'massacres' at aid distribution points. Witnesses, health officials and the UN human rights office say Israeli forces have repeatedly fired on crowds seeking aid, killing more than 1,000 people. Israel says its forces have only fired warning shots and that the death toll is exaggerated.
'The government of Israel's restrictions, delays and fragmentation under its total siege have created chaos, starvation and death,' the letter said.
Israel's Foreign Ministry rejected the criticism and accused the groups of 'echoing Hamas's propaganda'. It said it has allowed around 4,500 aid trucks to enter Gaza since lifting a complete blockade in May, and that more than 700 are waiting to be picked up and distributed by the United Nations.
Israeli activists take part in a protest against the war in the Gaza Strip (AP)
That is an average of around 70 trucks a day, the lowest rate of the war and far below the 500-600 trucks a day the UN says are needed, and which entered during a six-week ceasefire earlier this year.
Advertisement
The UN says it has struggled to deliver aid inside Gaza because of Israeli military restrictions, ongoing fighting, and a breakdown of law and order. An alternative system established by Israel and an American contractor has been marred by violence and controversy.
An official familiar with ceasefire negotiations between Israel and Hamas said Ron Dermer, a top adviser to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, was travelling to Rome to meet Mr Witkoff on Thursday to discuss the state of the talks.
US officials said Mr Witkoff planned to head to Europe this week. The State Department spokesperson said he was headed to the Middle East in a sign that momentum may be building towards a deal.
The evolving deal, which is still being hammered out, is expected to include a 60-day ceasefire in which Hamas would release 10 living hostages and the remains of 18 others in phases in exchange for Palestinians imprisoned by Israel. Aid supplies would be ramped up and the two sides would hold negotiations on a lasting truce.
Advertisement
"Silencing voices.
As if banning international media is not enough.
Humanitarian workers are also banned when they report on atrocities committed in
#Gaza
and elsewhere in the occupied Palestinian territory.
The denial of a visa to our colleague from
@OCHAopt
is the latest in…
pic.twitter.com/ewMk0PUY7o
— UNRWA (@UNRWA)
July 22, 2025
Israel has continued to carry out waves of daily air strikes against what it says are militant targets but which often kill women and children. Israel blames civilian deaths on Hamas because the militants operate in densely populated areas.
Strikes overnight and into Wednesday killed at least 21 people, more than half of them women and children, according to local health officials.
One of the strikes hit a house in Gaza City, killing at least 12 people, according to Shifa Hospital, which received the casualties.
The dead included six children and two women, according to Gaza's Health Ministry. The Israeli military said it struck an Islamic Jihad militant, and that the incident was under review because of reports of civilian casualties.
Advertisement
Another strike hit an apartment in northern Gaza, killing at least six people. Among the dead were three children and two women, including one who was pregnant. Eight others were wounded, the ministry said.
Palestinians are relying on aid in an increasingly dire humanitarian situation (AP)
A third strike hit a tent in Gaza City late Tuesday and killed three children, Shifa Hospital said.
There was no immediate comment from the military on those strikes.
Hamas-led militants abducted 251 people in the October 7 attack, and killed around 1,200 people, mostly civilians.
More than 59,000 Palestinians have been killed during the war, according to Gaza's Health Ministry.
Its count does not distinguish between militants and civilians, but the ministry says that more than half of the dead are women and children. The UN and other international organisations see it as the most reliable source of data on casualties.
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

Released Israeli-Argentinian hostage fights for brother still held by Hamas
Released Israeli-Argentinian hostage fights for brother still held by Hamas

The Independent

timean hour ago

  • The Independent

Released Israeli-Argentinian hostage fights for brother still held by Hamas

As Israel has announced steps to increase humanitarian aid in Gaza, a former Israeli-Argentinian hostage knows first-hand what that could mean for captives of the Hamas militant group. Iair Horn, who spent a year and a half in captivity, said hostages could tell when more aid was available because they would receive more food. 'When there's less food, then there's also less for the hostages. When there's aid, there's a possibility you might get a cucumber,' said Horn, 46. Hamas militants kidnapped Horn from his home at Kibbutz Nir Oz, along with 250 other people, during the group's cross-border attack on Oct. 7, 2023. He was released Feb. 15 after 498 days in captivity. For most of that time, he was held in an underground cell in a tunnel with several other hostages, including his younger brother Eitan Horn, 38. Since his release, Iair Horn has deferred his own recovery to fight for the release of his brother and the other 50 hostages still being held in Gaza, 20 of whom are still believed to be alive. Negotiations collapse again Hearing that negotiations between Israel and Hamas were once again frozen over the weekend was devastating for his family, Horn said. Since his release, he has made four trips to the U.S., where he has met with President Donald Trump and other American leaders to plead for the hostages. He wasn't sure what to make of a comment Thursday by Trump special envoy Steve Witkoff, who said the U.S. would consider 'alternative options' after recalling its negotiating team from Qatar. 'I'm not a politician, and I'm not getting into those things because I don't understand them. What I understand is very simple: I want my brother back,' Horn said. 'My life is frozen right now. I live in a nightmare that every day they are kidnapping me anew,' he said. Horn, who is single, is currently living with family in Kfar Saba, a city near Tel Aviv. Previously, he worked a variety of jobs in Kibbutz Nir Oz, including in education, maintenance and the kitchen. He also ran the kibbutz pub. Every morning when he opens his eyes, he must think for a few moments to remember where he is, to remember he is no longer a hostage, Horn said. He's gained back some of the weight he lost in captivity, but his list of physical and psychological ailments is long. He does not know where he will live, what he will do in the future, or if he will go back to Nir Oz. The only thing he concentrates on is advocating for his brother's release. 'I never imagined that another half year would pass without seeing my little brother,' he said. Israel's war in Gaza has killed more than 59,700 Palestinians, according to Gaza's Health Ministry. The agency's count doesn't distinguish between militants and civilians, but the ministry says that more than half of the dead are women and children. The U.N. and other international organizations see the ministry, which operates under the Hamas government, as the most reliable source of data on casualties. Brothers were held together Iair Horn is the oldest of three brothers who grew up in Argentina. He moved to Israel at age 20, followed by his middle brother, Amos. Eitan and their parents, long divorced, joined later. On Oct. 7, 2023, Eitan was visiting Iair at his home on Kibbutz Nir Oz when the sirens started, warning of incoming missiles. Soon they received text messages alerting them to the fact that militants had infiltrated the kibbutz. Militants entered Iair's home, where he was hiding in the reinforced safe room with Eitan. Iair attempted to hold the door shut until they began shooting through the door. Then he decided to surrender, worried they might use grenades or stronger weapons. Iair, who was immediately taken into Gaza, didn't know what had happened to his brother until around the 50th day of his captivity, when the militants placed the two brothers together, and Iair realized Eitan had also been kidnapped. Being together, even in their small, barred room, was a stroke of luck, Iair said. 'There's a lot of time with nothing to do, and we talked a lot about our childhoods, about elementary school, about the youth movement, about soccer,' he said. 'We tried to keep our sense of humor. He would ask me, did you brush your teeth? And I'd ask him, did you wash your bellybutton?' 'It was silly things, silly things between siblings that I don't have right now. Many times it happens now that something happens to me on the street that I have to tell him. And I can't, and I'm so sorry,' he said, starting to cry. Captors tell hostages that two will be released For most of the time, the Horn brothers were held with three other hostages. In early February, their captors came to the group of five and said that two would be released. 'For four days, we're looking at each other and wondering if we can decide or influence the decision,' he said. After four days, the captors arrived with a small plate of snacks and a video camera. They announced that Iair and another hostage would be leaving and filmed the emotional interaction between Iair and Eitan. Hamas later released the video on its social media channels, as it has with other videos of the hostages filmed under duress. Their last night together, Eitan and Iair laid side by side in silence. 'There was no conversation because in your head you don't want to have a conversation as if it's your last conversation,' Iair Horn said. When their mother, Ruty Chmiel Strum, learned that Iair was coming out but not Eitan, she said to anyone who would listen, "Why are you doing this to my sons? They are together and you're separating them?' No one gave her an answer, but Strum clung to hope that Eitan would be released soon. Now she mostly ignores news about the negotiations, tuning out the information to protect herself. She said she raised her three boys 'as a single body,' and their support for each other is unshakable. She clasps Iair's hand as they sit together on the couch in her home and looks forward to the day Eitan returns. 'I will feel the hug of my three sons, enjoying life, each supporting each other," she said. "It will happen.'

Ministers gather at UN for delayed meeting on Israel, Palestinians
Ministers gather at UN for delayed meeting on Israel, Palestinians

Reuters

timean hour ago

  • Reuters

Ministers gather at UN for delayed meeting on Israel, Palestinians

UNITED NATIONS, July 28 (Reuters) - Dozens of ministers will gather at the United Nations on Monday for a delayed conference to work toward a two-state solution between Israel and the Palestinians, but the U.S. and Israel are boycotting the event. The 193-member U.N. General Assembly decided in September last year that such a conference would be held in 2025. Hosted by France and Saudi Arabia, the conference was postponed in June after Israel attacked Iran. The conference aims to lay out the parameters for a roadmap to a Palestinian state, while ensuring Israel's security. French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot told newspaper La Tribune Dimanche in an interview published on Sunday that he will also use the conference this week to push other countries to join France in recognizing a Palestinian state. France intends to recognize a Palestinian state in September at the annual gathering of world leaders at the United Nations General Assembly, President Emmanuel Macron said last week. "We will launch an appeal in New York so that other countries join us to initiate an even more ambitious and demanding dynamic that will culminate on September 21," Barrot said, adding that he expected Arab countries by then to condemn Palestinian militants Hamas and call for their disarmament. The conference comes as a 22-month war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza still rages. The war was triggered on October 7, 2023, when Hamas killed 1,200 people in southern Israel and took some 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies. Since then, Israel's military campaign has killed nearly 60,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health authorities. The U.S. will not attend the conference at the United Nations, said a State Department spokesperson, describing it as "a gift to Hamas, which continues to reject ceasefire proposals accepted by Israel that would lead to the release of hostages and bring calm in Gaza." The State Department spokesperson added that Washington voted against the General Assembly last year calling for the conference and would "not support actions that jeopardize the prospect for a long-term, peaceful resolution to the conflict." Israel is also not taking part in the conference, "which doesn't first urgently address the issue of condemning Hamas and returning all of the remaining hostages," said Jonathan Harounoff, international spokesperson at Israel's U.N. mission. The U.N. has long endorsed a vision of two states living side by side within secure and recognized borders. Palestinians want a state in the West Bank, east Jerusalem and Gaza Strip, all territory captured by Israel in the 1967 war with neighboring Arab states. The U.N. General Assembly in May last year overwhelmingly backed a Palestinian bid to become a full U.N. member by recognizing it as qualified to join and recommending the U.N. Security Council "reconsider the matter favorably." The resolution garnered 143 votes in favor and nine against. The General Assembly vote was a global survey of support for the Palestinian bid to become a full U.N. member - a move that would effectively recognize a Palestinian state - after the U.S. vetoed it in the U.N. Security Council several weeks earlier.

The time for Australia to recognise the state of Palestine is right now
The time for Australia to recognise the state of Palestine is right now

The Guardian

time2 hours ago

  • The Guardian

The time for Australia to recognise the state of Palestine is right now

No one should underestimate the power of one image to move the minds of nations. Just like the image of nine-year-old South Vietnamese girl Pham Thi Kim Phúc, running naked on a road, screaming as her back burned from napalm dropped during an attack by the South Vietnamese air force. That moment was captured by photographer Nick Ut. The New York Times debated running the photo due to its nudity. They ran it on their front page the next day in edited form. It became powerfully attached to the Vietnam war and rippled through global opinion. The memory of this image bolted to my mind's forefront when I saw last week the images of children starving in Gaza plastered across almost every media outlet in the world, including conservative UK outlet the Daily Express, which featured a staggering front page with a gaunt Muhammad Zakariya Ayyoub al-Matouq – a one-year-old so starved, he now weighs the same as a three-month-old baby. His spine sticks out like a knotted thread – an image that whipped a headline out of the Daily Express: 'For pity's sake, stop this', declaring that the suffering 'shames us all'. Muhammad is not the victim of a drought, or an event beyond the control of people and governments. It's no accident, this boy – like so many children in Gaza – has barely any energy to lift eyelids. This is a result of deliberate decisions by the Netanyahu government to restrict humanitarian aid into Gaza. The significance of the Daily Express featuring this image should not be overlooked. A publication with a conservative bent has taken a strong stand because the humanitarian cause should not be political. These images have torn through social media. The same week, one of the biggest western nations – and the first member of the G7 – France, announced it would officially recognise the state of Palestine at September's UN general assembly. About 147 nations already recognise the state of Palestine – but none as large as France. That's significant. So many nations have lost patience and are unable to stay silent or inert, as the Netanyahu government continually demonstrates its refusal to conduct its pursuit of Hamas in a way that respects the life of innocent civilians, something demanded by international humanitarian law. Our prime minister's strong statement this week and his recognition over the weekend that 'Quite clearly it is a breach of international law to stop food being delivered, which was a decision that Israel made in March', paves the way for further action. This is the moment for our nation to take a similar stand. I'm proud that our party has twice agreed at its highest decision-making forum – the National Conference of the Australian Labor party – to recognise the state of Palestine. The time to do so is absolutely right now. It would be so close to the declaration of the French, sending a powerful signal, build momentum and likely influence other nations, even though at this moment the UK and German governments appear unmoved. It's not that the move of its own will point-blank end the suffering experienced by Palestinians in Gaza. There is so much crucial work to be done. But it will cement and back in the stand taken by 28 nations last week – rightly including Australia – to object to any re-partitioning of Gaza into concentration zones, tantamount to ethnic cleaning. While our party position has been straightforward, our government has understandably believed recognition should be part of a peace process. That has been a clear-cut, logical stand for the times. But times change. Just when we think we can't be shocked further, every month of this 20-month campaign has seemingly proved us wrong and this demands a rethink in our response. It's also blazingly clear that the Netanyahu government has absolutely no intention of recognising a Palestinian state. Not now, not ever. That's clearly not a party you can negotiate a peace process with, especially if they're not even prepared to warm a seat at the negotiating table (frankly that seat will have to be dragged into the room collectively by the actions of the international community). French president Emmanuel Macron felt no need to observe conditionality prior to making his announcement. He did set out nearly half a dozen important markers as part of the recognition process, which Australia would not conceivably object to. These included: an immediate ceasefire, the immediate release of all Israeli hostages, a massive surge of humanitarian aid into Gaza, the demilitarisation of Hamas. The fact that only over the weekend the Netanyahu government is allowing 'minimal' aid into the territory demonstrates that the actions of the French government mattered, they made a difference. The time is right for Australia to recognise Palestine. Last week, I took part in a vigil outside Parliament House. Parliamentarians of different stripes took shifts in reading out the names of the 17,000 teenagers and children killed in Gaza since 7 October. 17,000 names listed in a book whose weight dragged on the heart. The pages formatted into a grid: name, age, gender. I can't describe to you how confronting it was, as the eye moved left to right, reading a name where the age 0 was listed beside it. I kept thinking to myself: that baby deserved to be raised and nurtured within the love of a family, to laugh and play with other kids, to grow to fulfil their own ambitions, write their own history. Yet their history is starkly recorded as a name subsumed within a thicket of lines and pages captured in a book of casualties. If a conservative outlet such as the Daily Express can summon heart to demand better for children like Muhammad, why can't Australian conservatives do the same, the ones who champion pro-family values but are silent in the face of families being wiped out. We can and should feel for both Israeli and Palestinian families. We're all human after all, right? Ed Husic is the federal Labor MP for Chifley in western Sydney

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store