21 children have died from malnutrition and starvation in Gaza in just the past 72 hours. This was reported by Dr. Mohammed Abu Salmiya, director of Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, to the British public broadcaster BBC.
According to Gaza’s health ministry, an additional 15 adults have died from starvation and malnutrition in the past day. This brings the total number of such deaths to 101, of which 80 are children, according to the ministry.
Dr. Abu Salmiya warns that the situation is critical. Around 900,000 children in Gaza are suffering from hunger, and 70,000 of them are in a state of malnutrition. Diabetics and kidney patients are at particularly high risk, according to the doctor.
Acute humanitarian crisis
The organization Save the Children confirms the devastating situation on the ground.
— Everyone in Gaza is hungry now, says Rachel Cummings, humanitarian director at Save the Children, to Al Jazeera.
Gaza’s health ministry is under Hamas control, but has in previous conflicts proven to provide death tolls that correspond well with independent assessors’ figures.
Facts about starvation and genocide
Starvation as a method involves deliberately causing or exacerbating famine to destabilize, oppress, or eliminate a group of people. This can occur by blocking access to food, stopping humanitarian aid, or attacking food infrastructure, which directly threatens the survival of civilian populations.
International law, particularly humanitarian law and international law, prohibits the use of starvation as a weapon in armed conflicts. UN Security Council Resolution 2417 recognizes starvation as a war crime when deliberately used as a method of warfare and calls on states and parties to conflict to guarantee the civilian population's right to food. Additionally, the use of starvation is classified as a war crime or crime against humanity under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court when the starvation is intentional and directed against a specific group.
Starvation can also be part of genocide when used with the intent to wholly or partially destroy a national, ethnic, religious, or other particular group. By depriving groups of their basic needs and thereby causing death and suffering, this tactic fulfills the criteria for genocide according to international conventions such as the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
