Hospitals in the Gaza Strip are reporting seven new deaths due to “famine and malnutrition” as Israel continues its starvation campaign against the Palestinian territory. Gaza’s hunger-related death toll is now at 154, with at least 89 children among the dead. Palestinian officials say Israel allowed just 109 aid trucks to cross into the Gaza Strip on Tuesday — with most of them looted amid escalating security chaos. The U.N. says 500 to 600 truckloads of aid are needed each day to meet the basic needs of Gaza’s more than 2 million residents.
On Tuesday, displaced Palestinian mother Jihan al-Quraan was forced to collect scattered pasta from the dirt for her seven family members to eat, after she returned from a soup kitchen in Nuseirat Tuesday empty-handed.
Jihan al-Quraan: “We’re in a great famine. I’m in a famine now. I’m in a famine because the meal they give isn’t sufficient for me at all. I only have this meal for an entire day, until the following day when I come back to look for the soup kitchen to get food for my children. I only have this meal. Look at me. I have malnutrition from the lack of food. I feel dizzy when I walk.”
Meanwhile, Israeli forces are continuing deadly attacks on Palestinians, with at least 21 people killed since dawn, 13 of them while seeking aid.