The rate of young children suffering from acute malnutrition in Gaza has nearly tripled since a ceasefire earlier this year when aid flowed more freely, according to data collected by humanitarian groups and released by the UN on Thursday.
The report was issued at a time when aid distribution in the Palestinian enclave is under intense scrutiny because of deadly shootings close to the operations of a new US-backed system.
After the two-month ceasefire broke down in March, Israel blockaded aid supplies into Gaza for 11 weeks, prompting a famine warning from a global hunger monitor. Israel, which has only partially lifted the blockade since, vets all aid into Gaza and accuses Hamas of stealing some of it – something the militant group denies.
About 5.8 per cent of nearly 50,000 children under five who were screened in the second half of May were diagnosed with acute malnutrition. This was found in an analysis by a group of UN and other aid agencies known as the nutrition cluster.
Friedrich Merz gets ready for Trump’s Oval Office endurance test
Determined not to let his murder silence him, friends of Dom Phillips finish his book on the Amazon
Elon Musk leaves Trump’s club, yet he was never quite part of it
Trump v Harvard: University faces existential battle against opponent that would have once been unimaginable
The figure is up from 4.7 per cent in early May and is nearly three times the rate recorded in February, when there was a pause in fighting, the analysis said. It did not specify the exact rate in February, nor say how many children were screened.
The analysis also reported an increase in severe acute malnutrition cases among children – a life-threatening condition that compromises the immune system.
It said medical-support centres have been forced to close in north Gaza and Rafah in the south of the enclave, leaving children without access to lifesaving treatment.
It did not give a reason for the closures but many medical centres have run out of supplies, been damaged in the war or attacked by Israel, which accuses Hamas of using them for military purposes. Hamas denies using them in this way.
A Palestinian minister reported 29 starvation-related deaths among the children and elderly in the space of a few days last month.
Separately, medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said on Thursday that doctors in the Gaza Strip were donating their own blood to save their patients after scores of Palestinians were gunned down while trying to get food aid. - Reuters
(c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2025
