Doctors and aid workers are watching helplessly as Palestinian children die of starvation and treatable injuries, as the malnutrition crisis in Gaza reaches catastrophic levels.
Harrowing images shared by charities show the bodies of malnourished babies who have now died from a lack of sustenance. Heartbreaking testimony from doctors on the ground has also revealed how they are forced to stand by as children die from treatable injuries because of a lack of equipment and resources.
Speaking from Gaza, Tarek Loubani—a Canadian emergency physician and medical director of the humanitarian organisation Glia—said, “What I see in the hospital right now is that every single patient is starving.” Loubani described Israel’s actions in Gaza, including the weaponisation and blocking of aid,12 as “depraved and criminal.”
Reports suggest that 147 people, including 88 children, have died of malnutrition in Gaza in the conflict so far. One such child, a baby named Zainab (fig 1), died just a couple of weeks after being seen by Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP) in Gaza.
A malnourished infant in the paediatric ward of Gaza’s Nasser Hospital on 15 July
Palm Media/MAP
MAP said in a statement, “We met her mother just a couple of weeks ago at Nasser Hospital. She couldn’t find the medical care Zainab needed here in Gaza, nor was she allowed medical evacuation, as her mother was hoping for. More children will die, one by one, as this madness …
