Death toll in Gaza rises
The Health Ministry in the enclave says 84 people killed and 168 injured were reported to Gaza’s hospitals in the last 24 hours. The toll includes the bodies of six people killed in the previous days but whose bodies were recovered today.
The death toll from Israeli attacks since October 7, 2023 has risen to 51,439, with 117,416 injured, a statement on Telegram said, adding that the number of people killed in Gaza since Israel resumed hostilities last month has passed 2,000.
WFP says food stocks depleted in Gaza due to blockade
The World Food Programme (WFP) says food stocks have been depleted in Gaza due to the ongoing closure of crossings into the enclave.
“No humanitarian or commercial supplies have entered Gaza for more than seven weeks as all main border crossing points remain closed. This is the longest closure the Gaza Strip has ever faced, exacerbating already fragile markets and food systems,” the WFP said in a statement to journalists.
Since the beginning of March, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu banned aid deliveries into Gaza in a move he said was to pressure Hamas into accepting an extension of the first stage of the ceasefire deal, which Israel broke.
- The World Food Programme says it delivered its last remaining food stocks to hot-meal kitchens in Gaza, which “are expected to fully run out of food in the coming days”.
- Food prices in Gaza have skyrocketed as much as 1,400 percent compared with prices during the brief ceasefire that Israel broke in March.
- “More than 116,000 metric tonnes of food assistance – enough to feed one million people for up to four months – is positioned at aid corridors and is ready to be brought into Gaza” by WFP and its partners, but is being prevented due to the Israeli blockade.
- “You are having hunger again in the Gaza Strip. You don’t find dairy products, you don’t find meat, you don’t find fish. There’s practically no availability related even to fruits. Different stocks that are still out there in some of the shops, you see that they are running short.”
“We were serving as the WFP maybe 400,000 people with these hot meals. And all together, with all the different NGOs that are on the ground, we are serving practically one million people – so a bit less than half the population in the Gaza Strip,” Antoine Renard, WFP’s Palestine representative, told Al Jazeera, adding that: “We are all running short, we are being depleted.”
Palestinians wait to receive food at a charity kitchen in Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza on April 24
Palestinians face ‘catastrophic’ situation as supplies run out
Amjad Shawa, director of the Palestinian NGO network, has warned that community kitchens still operating in Gaza only have enough food to last them a few days.
“For 54 days, the borders were closed totally. Nothing entered,” Shawa told Al Jazeera from Gaza City. “Now, we are in a collapse of the humanitarian system. Our capacity to respond to these huge needs became more limited day by day. We have no food – no milk, no eggs, no meat,” he explained.
Shawa called on the international community to take action “to pressure Israel to stop its war and at the same time, to open these crossings” to allow humanitarian supplies into the enclave.
