OCHA warns Gaza humanitarian crisis ‘at its darkest point yet’
The humanitarian situation in Gaza has reached its worst stage as Israeli authorities have undermined our teams’ ability to provide real humanitarian aid, says the statement by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the Palestinian Territory.
Its statement said Israel allowed “a trickle” of aid into Gaza – some nutrition and medical supplies, as well as flour – but banned most other items, including fuel, cooking gas, shelter and hygiene products.
“They also imposed the condition that we could only deliver flour to bakeries and not directly to families. This required people to face large crowds to collect bread from a limited number of bakeries daily,” the OCHA statement read.
“Over the weekend, bakeries that were once supported with humanitarian supplies have shut down due to growing insecurity from large desperate crowds,” it added.
“Food needs to be distributed in multiple forms, and at multiple sites across all Gaza governorates. This is the only way to restore order and prevent mass starvation.”
Statement by the Humanitarian Country Team of the Occupied Palestinian Territory – on #Gaza: https://t.co/c2qjKTG3rT pic.twitter.com/X0xYzfXPx0
— OCHA OPT (Palestine) (@ochaopt) May 28, 2025
Canadian doctors describe horrific scenes in Gaza, demand arms embargo
Deirdre Nunan, a Canadian orthopaedic surgeon who spent seven weeks volunteering in Gaza, has delivered powerful testimony during a news conference urging Canada to take action to stop the death and destruction in the enclave.
Speaking alongside other doctors, Nunan said she treated patients with injuries “consistent with weaponised drones and powerful explosions” daily.
“When the ceasefire was broken on March 18, my first patient was a young man – 19 years old – his leg torn from his body at the level of his hip,” she said.
“It is one of the worst limb injuries I have seen in my entire career, but yet, I saw two more patients with almost identical injuries in the four weeks that followed and so many more injuries that were just as devastating.”
Nunan called on the Canadian government to take “meaningful action” to stop Israel’s war, including imposing a two-way arms embargo on the country and prosecute attacks on Gaza healthcare facilities.
‘We can’t say we didn’t know’: Israeli academics demand end to war
More than 1,200 Israeli academics have issued an open letter calling on the heads of Israeli academic institutions to “speak out” and act to stop the war on Gaza.
“Academics have to make their voices heard,” Raphael Greenberg, a professor at Tel Aviv University who signed onto the letter, told Al Jazeera.
The academics’ letter is the latest in a growing number of open letters protesting the war from within Israel.
However, while many other letters have objected to the political reasons for Israel’s latest offensive, or claimed that it puts Israel’s remaining captives held in Gaza at risk, the academics’ letter is unique in that it places Palestinian suffering at the heart of its objections to the war.
