‘Our Children Are Dying Slowly’ Says Father Searching for Food in Gaza 

Palestinians inspect the site of an Israeli strike on a house, in Jabalia, northern Gaza Strip May 21, 2025. (Reuters)
Palestinians inspect the site of an Israeli strike on a house, in Jabalia, northern Gaza Strip May 21, 2025. (Reuters)
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‘Our Children Are Dying Slowly’ Says Father Searching for Food in Gaza 

Palestinians inspect the site of an Israeli strike on a house, in Jabalia, northern Gaza Strip May 21, 2025. (Reuters)
Palestinians inspect the site of an Israeli strike on a house, in Jabalia, northern Gaza Strip May 21, 2025. (Reuters)

Father of four Mahmoud al-Haw and other Palestinians crowd around a soup kitchen in war-ravaged Gaza, surging forward and frantically waving pots.

Small children, squashed at the front, are in tears. One of them holds up a plastic basin hoping for some ladles of soup. Haw pushes forward in the scrum until he receives his share.

Haw does this every day because he fears his children are starving. He sets out through the ruins of Jabalia in northern Gaza in search of food, waiting in panicked crowds for up to six hours to get barely enough to feed his family.

Some days he gets lucky and can find lentil soup. Other days he returns empty-handed.

"I have a sick daughter. I can't provide her with anything. There is no bread, there is nothing," said Haw, 39.

"I'm here since eight in the morning, just to get one plate for six people while it is not enough for one person."

Israel has blocked the entry of medical, food and fuel supplies into Gaza since the start of March, prompting international experts to warn of looming famine in the besieged enclave that is home to 2.3 million Palestinians.

Some trucks were allowed to enter Gaza on Monday, after Israel agreed to allow limited humanitarian deliveries to resume following mounting international pressure. But by Tuesday night, the United Nations said no aid had been distributed.

And as well as aid shortages, fighting in Gaza has intensified. Last week the Israeli military announced the start of a major new operation against the Hamas group. Medics in the territory say Israeli strikes have killed more than 500 people in the past eight days.

Israel's stepped-up campaign has strained its relations with much of the world. European countries including France, Germany and Britain have said the situation in Gaza is intolerable, and even the support of its closest ally, the United States, now appears to be wavering.

Israel denies that Gaza is facing a hunger crisis. It has said its blockade is aimed in part at preventing Hamas from diverting and seizing aid supplies. Hamas has denied doing so and accuses Israel of using starvation as a military tactic.

DAILY SEARCH FOR FOOD

Gazans like Haw, living in the epicenter of the war that is now in its 20th month, have no voice in the debate.

Haw's world consists of walking to food kitchens each day, through the destruction wrought by Israeli bombardments in the war that was triggered by the Hamas-led attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, in which gunmen killed 1,200 people and took 251 hostages back to Gaza, according to Israeli tallies.

Israel's military campaign in Gaza has killed more than 53,000 people, according to Palestinian health authorities.

Even before the war - fought intensively around the family home in Jabalia, just north of Gaza City - Haw's family had its struggles. His niece, who lives with them, uses a wheelchair. His daughter has heart disease and bronchial asthma, he says.

Haw climbs the stairs to his one-room apartment, where his children wait, sitting on a mattress. There is no surprise about what he has brought home - soup again.

He puts the soup in small tin bowls and hands them to his four children and his brother's two children.

The children, quiet, eat slowly and carefully.

"Thank God, as you can see, this is breakfast, lunch and dinner, thank God," he said. The day before, he said, his family had had nothing to eat.

"I wish everyone would stand by us. Our children are dying slowly," said Haw.



Doctors and Moms Say Babies in Gaza May Die without More Formula, Blame Israel’s Blockade

 Seham Fawzy Khodeir watches her son, Hisham, who is just days old and was born prematurely, lying in an incubator at the neonatal intensive care unit of Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, Thursday, June 19, 2025. (AP)
Seham Fawzy Khodeir watches her son, Hisham, who is just days old and was born prematurely, lying in an incubator at the neonatal intensive care unit of Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, Thursday, June 19, 2025. (AP)
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Doctors and Moms Say Babies in Gaza May Die without More Formula, Blame Israel’s Blockade

 Seham Fawzy Khodeir watches her son, Hisham, who is just days old and was born prematurely, lying in an incubator at the neonatal intensive care unit of Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, Thursday, June 19, 2025. (AP)
Seham Fawzy Khodeir watches her son, Hisham, who is just days old and was born prematurely, lying in an incubator at the neonatal intensive care unit of Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, Thursday, June 19, 2025. (AP)

Seham Fawzy Khodeir watches as her son lies inside a dilapidated incubator and listens to his faint cry, mixed with the muted sound of the equipment.

The mother of six is increasingly concerned about the survival of Hisham al-Lahham, who was just days old, breathing with the help of equipment and being fed through a tube in his tiny nose.

Most alarming is that the medical-grade formula he needs to survive is running out.

"There is no milk," the 24-year-old mother told The Associated Press. He needs it to "to get better, to live and to see life."

Hisham is among 580 premature babies at risk of death from starvation across the war-battered Gaza Strip, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. Khodeir and others blame Israel’s blockade for the plight of their children. Doctors say that although some formula has been delivered, the situation is dire. Their desperation comes as the war in Gaza has been overshadowed by the Israel-Iran war.

"These babies have no time ... and no voice," said Dr. Ahmed al-Farah, head of the pediatrics and obstetrics department at Nasser Hospital, the main medical facility still partially functional in southern Gaza.

'An avoidable disaster'

Khodeir's son is one of 10 babies in incubators at Nasser's neonatal intensive care unit. Last week, al-Farah rang the alarm, saying the hospital’s stock of medical-grade formula was "completely depleted."

He said the tiny babies who relied on it would face "an avoidable disaster" in two to three days.

His pleas were answered, in part, by the delivery of 20 boxes of formula sent over the weekend by a US aid group, Rahma Worldwide. The new delivery is enough to cover the needs for the 10 infants for up to two weeks, al-Farah said.

Al-Farah, however, expressed concern about future deliveries, saying that it wasn’t guaranteed that more formula would be allowed into Gaza.

"This is not enough at all," he said. "It solved the problem temporarily, but what we need is a permeant solution: Lift the siege."

Meanwhile, fortified formula required for newborns is already out of stock at Al-Rantisi Hospital in Gaza City, its director, Dr. Jamil Suliman, said.

"Many mothers are unable to breastfeed due to severe malnutrition," he said, warning of a looming crisis.

Infants are among the hardest hit by Israel’s blockade, which started on March 2 with the complete ban of any food, water, shelter or medication.

Under mounting international pressure and repeated warnings of famine from the United Nations, Israel began allowing what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called "minimal" aid, starting May 19.

Since then, more than 1,000 tons of baby food, including formula, have entered Gaza, according to COGAT, the Israeli defense agency in charge of aid coordination in the Palestinian territory.

"Food for babies is certainly entering (the Gaza Strip), as the organizations are requesting it, we are approving it, and there is no withholding of food for babies," a COGAT spokesperson said.

But Gaza’s health officials say that for these babies, that aid hasn't included enough critical medicine, formula, medical equipment, and spare parts to keep the existing equipment operational.

The Palestinian Center for Human Rights said in a report Monday that fortified infant formula was nearly depleted from local markets, with several types already completely out of stock.

"Any limited quantities available in some pharmacies are being sold at skyrocketing prices, far beyond the purchasing power of most families," it said.

COGAT said the baby food is being distributed mostly through international organizations — not via the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, an Israeli-backed private contractor that has drawn criticism from other groups. Palestinian witnesses and health officials say Israeli forces have opened fire on crowds heading to GHF sites. The Israeli military says it has fired warning shots.

Israel has defended its blockade

Israel has said the blockade aims to pressure Hamas into releasing the 50 hostages it still holds from its Oct. 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel that sparked the war. Fewer than half are still believed to be alive.

Israel has accused Hamas of siphoning aid, without providing evidence. The United Nations says there's been no significant diversion of aid.

Gunmen killed around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took 251 hostage on Oct. 7. Most of the hostages have been released by ceasefire agreements.

The war has unleashed unrelenting destruction, with more than 56,000 Palestinians killed and more than 131,00 wounded in Israel's offensive, according to Gaza health officials. The officials don't distinguish between combatants and civilians but say more than half the casualties are women and children.

The war and the blockade have sparked a humanitarian crisis, creating shortages of the most basic necessities and pushing Gaza’s health care system to the brink of collapse.

Seventeen of the enclave's 36 hospitals remain partially functioning, providing health care to more than 2 million people amid bombings, rising malnutrition rates and dwindling medical supplies.

"Starvation is increasing," said Jonathan Whittall, head of the UN's humanitarian affairs office for the occupied Palestinian territories. More than 110 children have been admitted for treatment for malnutrition every day since the start of this year, he said.

"Our warehouses stand empty while Israel restricts shipments to minimal quantities of mainly medical supplies and food," Whittall added.

A crisis at Gaza's hospitals

Human Rights Watch said in a recent report that all medical facilities in Gaza are operating in unsanitary and overcrowded conditions and have serious shortages of essential health care goods, including medicine and vaccines.

"Since the start of the hostilities in Gaza, women and girls are going through pregnancy lacking basic health care, sanitation, water, and food," said Belkis Wille, associate crisis, conflict and arms director at Human Rights Watch. "They and their newborns are at constant risk of preventable death."

The Health Ministry has repeatedly warned that medical supplies and fuel were running out at hospitals, which use fuel-powered generators amid crippling power outages.

Whittall said hospitals were forced to ration the little fuel they have "to prevent a complete shutdown of more life-saving services."

"Unless the total blockade on fuel entering Gaza is lifted, we will face more senseless and preventable death," he said.

Nasser Hospital was forced to cut off electricity for some departments, despite the nonstop flow of patients, as part of a plan to save fuel, said Ismail Abu-Nimer, head of engineering and maintenance.

Supplies have been running out amid the influx of wounded people, many coming from areas close to aid distribution centers, said Dr. Mohammad Saqer, Nasser's director of nursing.

"The situation here is terrifying, immoral, and inhumane," he said.