Jerusalem, Feb 20: One in six children are acutely malnourished in the isolated and largely devastated northern Gaza, according to a UNICEF study, while Israel has vowed to expand its five-moth offensive against Hamas to the enclave’s southernmost city of Rafah.
The report by the Global Nutrition Cluster says more than 90 per cent of children under 5 in Gaza eat two or fewer food groups a day, known as severe food poverty. A similar percentage are affected by infectious diseases, with 70 per cent experiencing diarrhea in the last two weeks. More than 80 per cent of homes lack clean and safe water, with the average household having one litre (quart) per person per day.
The UN Security Council is set to vote on a UN resolution demanding an immediate cease-fire on Tuesday, but the US said it would veto it because it’s trying to arrange a deal on its own that would bring a truce and the release of hostages held by Hamas.
The number of Palestinians killed during the war in Gaza has surpassed 29,000, according to the Health Ministry in Gaza, which does not distinguish between civilian and combatant casualties in its count. A quarter of Gaza’s residents are starving. About 1,200 people, mostly civilians, were killed and around 250 abducted in Hamas’ attack on Israel on October 7 that sparked the war.
Oxygen shortage kills 8 patients in Gaza hospital
Eight patients have died in a major hospital in southern Gaza’s Khan Younis city after days of power outage and oxygen supply shortage due to continuous Israeli strikes on the facility, said Palestinian Health Minister Mai al-Kaila.
Conditions of some other serious patients became life-threatening due to the cessation of required treatment under the Israeli attack on the Nasser Hospital, she said on Monday in a statement, while calling for international efforts to pressure the release of bedridden patients and medical staff, who she claimed were taken away by Israeli military trucks from the hospital to an unknown location, Xinhua news agency reported.
Israeli forces last Thursday stormed the Nasser Hospital in the southern Gaza Strip city of Khan Younis after demolishing its southern wall, the Hamas-run Health Ministry in Gaza earlier said.
The IDF said in a statement posted Sunday on social media platform X that it apprehended, in a joint operation with Israel Security Agency forces, hundreds of “terrorists” and other suspects who were hiding in the hospital, some posing as medical staff.
It said that large quantities of weapons and a vehicle belonging to an Israeli border kibbutz were found in the health facility, as well as medicines about to be handed over to Israeli hostages. It accused Hamas of using civilians in the hospital as human shields. (Agencies)
