Act now to stop ‘all-out catastrophe’ in besieged, bombed, starved north Gaza: WFP chief
Cindy McCain, executive director of the UN’s World Food Programme (WFP), said immediate steps must be taken to prevent an “all-out catastrophe” in northern Gaza where Israeli forces have maintained a monthlong siege on as many as 95,000 civilian residents amid a brutal military offensive in the area.
“The unacceptable is confirmed: Famine is likely happening in north Gaza,” McCain wrote on social media.
Steps must be taken immediately, McCain said, to allow the “safe, rapid [and] unimpeded flow of humanitarian [and] commercial supplies” to reach the besieged population in the north of the war-torn territory.
Earlier, a group of global food security experts reported that famine is likely “imminent within the northern Gaza Strip”.
The unacceptable is confirmed:
Famine is likely happening or imminent in north Gaza.
Immediate steps MUST BE TAKEN to allow safe, rapid & unimpeded flow of humanitarian & commercial supplies to prevent an all-out catastrophe. NOW. https://t.co/KmNSiKBDu9
— Cindy McCain (@WFPChief) November 8, 2024
WHO chief sounds alarm on famine warning in besieged north Gaza
World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has added his voice to rising concerns that the monthlong Israeli military siege of northern Gaza – where as many as 95,000 civilians could be trapped – has caused famine conditions.
“Deeply alarming,” Tedros said in a post on social media, with the attached report by the Famine Review Committee alert regarding the perilous situation in the north of the Gaza Strip.
Deeply alarming — @theIPCinfo warns there is a strong likelihood that famine in northern #Gaza is imminent.
We call for an immediate scale-up and safe access for humanitarian aid — primarily food and medicines for severe malnutrition — within days not weeks. https://t.co/YZtdPs4RXk
— Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (@DrTedros) November 8, 2024
Gaza’s population feel they are on ‘death row’: UN official
The entire population of Gaza “feels as if they have been put on death row”, a senior official with the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has said.
Jonathan Whittall, head of the office for OCHA in the occupied Palestinian territory, said the only difference between prisoners on death row and civilians in Gaza is “the speed at which you die”. “If not killed by bombs or bullets, they are slowly suffocating from a lack of the basic means of survival,” Whittall wrote in a series of searing posts on social media.
“Gaza now has the highest cohort of child amputees in the world,” he said. “Tens of thousands of Palestinians have life-altering injuries. Yet relentless bombardments continue, including in areas to which Israeli forces have ordered Palestinians to go,” he adds.
“The world has failed Gaza.”
1/11 Everyone in Gaza feels as if they have been put on death row. If not killed by bombs or bullets, they are slowly suffocating from a lack of the basic means of survival. The only difference is the speed at which you die. The world has failed #Gaza. A🧵… pic.twitter.com/UGgXsLI9Vh
— Jonathan Whittall (@_jwhittall) November 7, 2024
