Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that accusations that Israel is conducting a campaign of starvation in Gaza are a “bold faced lie”, in an extraordinary denial of the growing humanitarian crisis in the enclave.
As the Israeli leader attended a Christian conference in Jerusalem, he said: “There is no policy of starvation in Gaza and there is no starvation in Gaza.”
He added that Israel had “enabled the amount (of aid) required by international law to come in” and claimed Hamas “steals this humanitarian aid and then accuses Israel of not supplying it”.
Netanyahu was speaking at a conference on Sunday hosted by adviser to US President Donald Trump and prominent evangelical pastor Paula White, according to the Times of Israel.
His latest claims fly in the face of warnings from humanitarian organisations, who say that starvation and malnutrition has reached a critical point in Gaza.
The World Health Organisation declared on Tuesday that malnutrition is on a “dangerous trajectory” in the Gaza Strip, with 63 deaths in July. Around one in five small children in Gaza City are now acutely malnourished, according to the UN’s Palestinian refugee agency (Unrwa).
The UN has said that the hunger crisis is “entirely preventable” and accused Israel of the “deliberate blocking and delay of large-scale food, health and humanitarian aid”. At the start of March, Israel implemented a total aid blockade in Gaza for 11 weeks, preventing humanitarian aid from entering the area.
In May, the American-run Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) assumed control of aid distribution in Gaza, which was previously controlled by the UN. The new mechanism limits food distribution to a small number of hubs under guard of armed contractors. Since the change, hundreds of Palestinians have been shot dead while attempting to get aid.
Hamas has denied stealing aid from collection sites and a recent USAID internal report said there was no evidence of systematic looting of supplies.
Israel’s military on Monday suspended its daily operations between 10am and 8pm in parts of central and northern Gaza, promising to open aid corridors to let food and medical supplies in after international pressure.
However, within hours of this so-called “humanitarian pause”, Israeli forces resumed air raids which killed 63 people, according to Gaza health authorities.
Save the Children’s director for the Middle East, Ahmad Alhendawi, said on Sunday that these temporary pauses in fighting were not sufficient to tackle the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
The regional director said in a statement: “Any increase in the entry of aid via land crossings has the potential to help people survive, primarily children, thousands of whom are otherwise facing their final days after nearly five months of total siege on the entry of all assistance.
“But just how lifesaving these pauses will be depends on how long they continue and the extent to which Israeli authorities facilitate safe and logistically feasible conditions for the delivery of assistance to starving children and families.
“The stage of malnutrition and starvation many people across Gaza are facing means one or even a few days of food aid will not be enough to bring them back from the brink of death. Malnutrition can be prevented, malnutrition can be treated – and we know how to do it. Malnourished people, especially children, need sustained access to diverse food, nutrition supplements, and sometimes specialist medical care, to reverse the damage that can be undone.”
