The famine is official in the Gaza Strip. The integrated classification of food security in phases (CIF, in its acronym in Spanish), international system supported by the United Nations agencies that calibrates the food situation in the world, has declared this Friday the level of a famine in the city of Gaza and in the rest of municipalities and refugee fields that make up the Gaza Government.
According to CIF data, 514,000 people, almost a quarter of the Palestinians in Gaza, are suffering famine. The figure is expected to increase to 641,000 by the end of September. It is the first time that the CIF declares the level of famine outside the African continent.
“It is a famine a few hundred meters from the food, in a fertile land,” said Tom Fletcher, Deputy Secretary General of UN Humanitarian Affairs. “It is an openly promoted famine by some Israeli leaders as a weapon of war,” the British diplomat continued.
The Secretary General of the United Nations, António Guterres, has assured for his part that the famine’s statement “is no mystery.” “It is a disaster caused by man, a moral accusation and failure of humanity in itself,” said the Portuguese in X. “Children die and the people who must act do not. Israel, as the occupying power is obliged under international law to guarantee food and medical resources to the population,” he continued.
The CIF investigation requires the arrival of a high fire in the strip that allows to stop the spread of the famine towards other points of the enclave, something that expected that it will happen “during the next weeks” in deir the Balah (center) and Khan Youis (south), if things do not change on the ground. The CIF report reaches the doors of an offensive with which the Israel Army intends to expel the million Gazati that is concentrated in Gaza City, in maneuvers that humanitarian organizations have warned that would cause catastrophic consequences.
The CIF includes the level of famine in territories where 20% of households suffer extreme food deficiencies, when 30% of children suffer acute malnutrition and when the ratio of deaths caused by hunger exceeds the two adults or the four children a day per 10,000 inhabitants. It also considers it official when at least two of these criteria are met.
Rejection of Israel
The spokesman of the Foreign Ministry of Israel, Oren Marmorstein, has labeled the CIF investigation of being “custom -made” to fit with “the false campaign of Hamas” about hunger in the strip. “There is no famine in Gaza,” said the spokesman in a statement.
Meanwhile, Israel continues to advance to launch the assault and land invasion of Ciudad de Gaza. This Friday, Israel’s Minister of Defense, Israel Katz, has threatened to destroy this town, the largest Palestinian municipality, if Hamas rejects the main conditions it demands to end the war: the disarmament of the militia and the liberation of all the captives.
Katz has launched this warning in the same statement in which he has announced that the top Israeli leaders approved on Thursday night the plans “to defeat Hamas in Gaza”, in reference to the operation that Israel prepares for two weeks to occupy the entire city of Gaza, the largest municipality and capital of the Strip.
“The doors of hell will open soon about the murderers and rapists of Hamas in Gaza,” said Israeli minister in his social networks. If the Palestinian fighters do not accept Israel’s conditions to finish the war, Gaza City “will become Rafah or Beit Hanoun,” he said in what is a direct admission of the generalized destruction that the Israeli army has caused in those municipalities with mass bombing.
According to Katz, the new plans that Israel has for the enclave go along the same path, since they include “a lot of fire, evacuation of residents and maneuvers.”
On Thursday night, Israeli prime minister, Benjamín Netanyahu, baffled both Israelis and Palestinians ensuring that he had instructed to resume negotiations to free all captives. The statement was the first reference of the Israeli government towards the conversations for a high fire since Hamas approved on Monday a truce proposal that four days later the Israeli executive has not officially valued.
Despite that, Netanyahu insisted that the offensive against Ciudad de Gaza would continue until Hamas accepts peace “in the terms of Israel”, which means the disarmament of the militia, the demilitarization of the enclave, the release of the captives, the control of Israeli security on the strip and the appearance of a civil administration disconnected from Hamas and the Palestinian authority.
One million civilians are precarious concentrated in Gaza City. Humanitarian organizations have repeatedly warned that their forced displacement to the south, as Israel intends, would have catastrophic consequences. Israel disregard those notices. On Thursday, the Israeli army announced that it has instructed the health authorities and humanitarian workers who prepare to leave Gaza City and move south.
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