Famine Haunts the People of Gaza. Israel Is Trying to Convince You It’s Fake.

Palestinians line up for a meal in Beit Lahia in the Gaza Strip on April Photo Ramez Habboub Abaca Sipa USA via AP Images As a survivor of Israel s genocidal war on Gaza it breaks me to watch my people struggle to find something to fill their stomachs Israel s deliberate framework of starvation continues to tighten its grip on the enclave Humanitarian organizations have sounded the alarm warning that Gaza is on the verge of full-scale famine Since Israel shattered the ceasefire on March and sealed its blockade million Palestinians in Gaza have been cut off from essential food and aid As the World Food Programme and UNRWA have lately informed that their stocks of flour and food are depleted the danger of widespread starvation grows with each passing day I lived through the first wave of starvation in Gaza in the early months of a time when Israeli-imposed aid restrictions drove hunger to catastrophic levels Everyone across the Strip experienced severe food shortages with empty plates becoming a daily scene I was forced to leave Gaza alone in February and flee to Egypt after nearly five months of relentless bombardment and siege At the height of the famine I lost kilograms Related Israel s Ruthless Propaganda Campaign to Dehumanize Palestinians Since then I have devoted myself to fighting against Israeli propaganda narratives that distort the truth downplay Palestinian suffering and mock the agony Gazans endure While I investigate Israeli disinformation I carry the emotional weight of seeing the pain of my family still trapped in Gaza Like nearly every household there my family is running out of food and flour Each video call painfully reveals their shrinking bodies thinned by hunger A investigation conducted in late December uncovered that the average person in Gaza has lost around kilograms due to severe food insecurity during the war The situation has only worsened since Israel s Weaponization of Famine The Israeli blockade that began on March has driven food prices beyond reach My father communicated me last week that a -kilogram bag of flour now costs around U S dollars This week the price has climbed to I have seen videos of families grinding pasta and lentils to make makeshift bread for their starving children after running out of flour For countless lentil bread is not a choice but a last resort under a starvation diet imposed by the Israeli occupation After my family returned to our bombed-out home in the northern Gaza Strip in January of this year my brother Fahmy built a makeshift oven fueled by firewood to bake bread for our family and neighbors With all major bakeries shut down due to the flour shortage his small act of resistance became a vital lifeline Fahmy has been baking for over a month helping those around him He described me last week Fewer people come because flour is no longer available Those who still do often bring bug-infested flour the only thing they have left to feed their children With food increasingly scarce in Gaza much of the population now depends on tekias area kitchens for a single daily meal These tekias often limited to serving plain lentils pasta or rice have had to reduce portions due to Israel s blockade on food and cooking gas Amjad Al-Shawa director of the Palestinian Non-Governmental Organizations Organization has warned that countless tekias are on the brink of shutting down as food supplies dwindle Related Israel s Use of Mass Starvation as a Weapon of War I watch daily footage of people queuing and stampeding and children crying to receive a small meal These heartbreaking scenes are undeniable evidence of Israel s weaponization of starvation Even these minimal vital tekias have not been spared from Israeli attacks Gaza s Leadership Media Office disclosed that the Israeli military has targeted and bombed tekias since the war began Numerous Palestinians in Gaza have been forced to eat any animal they can find to get particular protein Shocking videos verified by myself and my colleagues in the press show people consuming sea turtles horses and even hedgehogs to survive A story that deeply moved me was that of a child Omar Qannan who reported he had eaten turtle meat despite his love for Raphael the superhero from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles It is devastating to imagine how Omar will ever watch his favorite cartoon character again without remembering that hunger once forced him to eat an animal he saw as a heroic friend Fact-Checking Israeli Hasbara Israeli trolls have waged an intensive hasbara or propaganda campaign to deny the famine ravaging Gaza even at its peak in February These denials persist despite repeated warnings from international organizations that Gaza is edging closer to famine and the evidence in front of our eyes On April an X user notorious for spreading Israeli propaganda posted a video of a man sitting by the beach in Gaza alleging he was enjoying a large kebab meal during the problem The user intentionally skipped the fact that the man was eating horse meat Another post stunned me It came from Gazawood a systematic campaign aiming to mock discredit and deny Palestinian suffering The video proved a woman in Gaza grinding pasta to bake bread for her children The Israeli propagandist accused the woman of staging her story for the camera instead of trying to feed her starving family On May I debunked a viral video intending to discredit the event of Fadi al-Zant a child from Gaza who was suffering from malnutrition before fleeing the Strip for urgent medicinal restoration Trolls cruelly accused his mother of deliberately starving him to stage a Pallywood scene Certain atrocity denials weaponized her appearance to cast doubt on her child s suffering These malicious insinuations ignore the basic truth that children are especially vulnerable during famine Their bodies weaken more rapidly and face a significantly higher danger of death in hunger crises as stated by the International Rescue Committee The United Nations stated nearly children were diagnosed with severe malnutrition last month alone an percent rise since February New videos of severely malnourished children like baby Siwar Ashour and -year-old Rahaf Ayad continue to haunt me Without urgent health evacuation these children may not survive Without immediate and sustained delivery of food and aid more children will fall victim to hunger and face the lifelong soundness consequences of starvation Israeli representatives are lying to our faces On July Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stood before the U S Congress and refuted Israel s role in obstructing humanitarian aid to Gaza Despite being riddled with misleading declares his speech drew applause from U S lawmakers who chose to overlook the catastrophic humanitarian problem unfolding in Gaza I have tracked several organizations affiliated with the Israeli governing body that have actively spread fake news and hate speech during the war Among them is HonestReporting a hasbara group claiming to be a media watchdog exposing anti-Israel bias The group worked to deny the famine in Gaza and undermine the credibility of independent experts It dismissed the findings of the Integrated Food Measure Phase Classification statement which warned that famine in Gaza was imminent by mid-March Rather than presenting the evidence HonestReporting relied on cherry-picked evidence to discredit the review s conclusions The Soft Language of Starvation Israeli extremist officers have consistently denied the existence of famine among Palestinians in Gaza while simultaneously pushing for harsher measures to block food and aid from reaching the besieged population Although international organizations have repeatedly warned about the imminent threat of famine these executives have not stopped inciting hate speech and ignoring the suffering of Gaza s population Israeli executives frame starvation and the blockade as strategic necessities Using soft language Israeli authorities frame starvation and the blockade as strategic necessities On April Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz stated No humanitarian aid to enter Gaza to pressure ceasefire negotiations Around the same time Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich disclosed Not a single grain of wheat will enter Gaza National Precaution Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir went even further lately calling for the Israeli forces to bomb food storage facilities in Gaza Read our complete coverage Israel s War on Gaza Starvation in Gaza has become yet another tool of death employed by Israel its slowest and the majority agonizing weapon It does not come with the sound of explosions it silently erodes life day by day further deepening an already dire humanitarian situation Exhausted by the news and disillusioned by the endless cycle of broken ceasefire promises my family in Gaza now turns to me for updates My role has shifted to one of constant reassurance I tell them what they want to hear that the edge crossings will soon open and hundreds of trucks carrying vital supplies including food and flour are on their way Yet deep down I know that the situation remains grim Each day without aid arriving in Gaza pushes more families to the brink of death The post Famine Haunts the People of Gaza Israel Is Trying to Convince You It s Fake appeared first on The Intercept