By Ephraim Agbo
In Gaza, hunger has stopped being a byproduct of war. It is the war.
Once again, the headlines speak of ceasefires and negotiations. But beyond the press conferences and diplomatic roundtables, children are dying quietly, their stomachs empty, their cries too weak to be heard. The question is no longer whether famine is coming—it’s here. And it’s being used to break a people’s spirit.
According to the United Nations, one in five children in Gaza City is now malnourished. In some areas, it's even worse.
But numbers can’t tell this story. Only faces can.
🧕 “We Are Watching Children Waste Away”
In a voice note from Deir al-Balah, Mayyada Al-Wada, communications officer for Medical Aid for Palestinians, doesn’t raise her voice—but her words thunder with grief:
“The conditions are beyond severe. We’ve seen children and pregnant women who haven’t eaten in days. There’s no full stomach here—just hunger, and silence. Just last week, four children died of acute malnutrition. Four. And we expect more.”
Her voice cracks slightly, then steadies.
“We’re exhausted. The people are exhausted. What we need isn’t charity. We need a ceasefire. We need access. We need the world to remember we exist.”
⚔ Hunger on the Front Line: Who’s Blocking the Aid?
Aid isn’t just struggling to get in—it’s being trapped, blocked, delayed. And turned into a weapon.
Israeli government spokesperson David Mencer blames Hamas for the chaos:
“We are facilitating aid. Hamas is the one looting trucks, preventing distribution, and manipulating food for control.”
But UN workers on the ground say the picture is far more grim—and far more dangerous.
“It’s not just Hamas. It’s airstrikes. It’s denied permits. It’s trucks sitting at the border while food spoils in the sun,” said a UN logistics coordinator under anonymity.
Even when food is inside Gaza, the violence makes it nearly impossible to move. Aid is literally stuck—within sight of the starving.
Doctors Without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières) recently accused Israel of using starvation as a weapon of war—a charge that, under international law, could constitute a war crime. Israel denies this, but under the Geneva Conventions, it is still responsible for ensuring food access for civilians in occupied territories.
🧒 The Photo That Stopped the Scrolling
Sometimes a war needs only one photo to explain everything.
It was taken by Palestinian photojournalist Ahmed Al-Raihna: 18-month-old Muhammad Zakaria, his eyes sunken, his ribs showing through his skin, held gently in his mother’s arms inside a tent made of plastic and prayer.
“The baby had no formula. No milk. No vitamins. His mother used a plastic bag instead of a diaper,” Ahmed recalled. “There was no crib. No toys. No hope.”
He paused. Not as a reporter—but as a father himself.
“I couldn’t breathe after the shot. It didn’t feel like journalism. It felt like a funeral.”
In just three weeks, Gaza’s Health Ministry says 48 people, including 20 children, have died of starvation or hunger-related illness. That’s nearly five times the rate from the previous five months.
🕊 Ceasefire Talks Shatter—And So Does Hope
While Gaza burns, diplomacy flickers out.
Israel accuses Hamas of backing out of ceasefire terms and attempting to regain control over aid distribution—something Israel fears could be exploited. Hamas denies this, saying Israel’s claims are excuses to prolong the blockade.
The result?
More deadlock. No ceasefire. No food trucks. No end.
✈ Symbolic Airdrops Begin—But It’s Not Enough
In response to rising international pressure, Israel has now allowed Jordan and the UAE to begin airdropping food into Gaza. The first packages fell from the sky just hours ago.
But aid groups are calling the airdrops “a lifeline too thin to hold”.
“You can’t feed 2 million people with parachutes,” said one UN worker. “These are gestures. The people need food, not optics.”
⚖ The Bottom Line: This Isn’t Famine. It’s a Siege.
This isn’t a natural disaster. It’s not an accident. It’s a deliberate strangling of life, masked by the language of policy and defense.
And while officials argue, a child in Gaza dies every 10 minutes from preventable causes, according to WHO estimates.
That child may not be named in the news. May not be photographed. May not even be buried with dignity.
But that child matters.
And history will ask what the world did when children began dying of hunger—on our watch, with our aid, on our conscience.
⏳ What Now?
If the international community allows hunger to be used as a military tactic, what kind of precedent does that set? If a child’s life can be weighed against a border permit or a policy memo, what does that say about us?
There is still time. Not much—but enough to act.
Let this story not end in silence.
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