“Israel is making deliberate choices to starve civilians. Imagine what it is like, not only to be trying to survive on 245 calories day in, day out, but also having to watch your children or elderly relatives do the same. All whilst displaced, with little to no access to clean water or a toilet, knowing most medical support has gone and under the constant threat of drones and bombs.”
Amitabh Behar, Oxfam International Executive Director
The Oxfam International media release goes on to say:
‘People in northern Gaza have been forced to survive on an average of 245 calories a day – less than a can of fava beans – since January, as Israeli forces continue their military onslaught. Over 300,000 people are believed to still be trapped there, unable to leave.
The miniscule amount of food represents less than 12 per cent of the recommended daily 2,100 calorie intake needed per person, calculated using demographic data considering variations by age and gender. Last week, the Israeli government told UNRWA, by far the largest aid provider in Gaza, that its convoys would no longer be allowed into the north.
Oxfam’s analysis is based on the latest available data used in the recent Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) analysis for the Gaza Strip. Oxfam also found that the total food deliveries allowed into Gaza for the entire 2.2 million population – since last October – amounted to an average of just 41 per cent of the daily calories needed per person.
Full media release (3/4/24) here
DEMOCRACY NOW
Speaking on Amy Goodman’s ‘Democracy Now’ programme, Professor Neve Gordon details Israel’s weaponisation of food access.
As the world reels from the World Central Kitchen attack in which seven aid workers in Gaza were struck and killed by three separate Israeli missiles while delivering aid for starving Palestinians, we speak with prominent Israeli scholar Neve Gordon about Israel’s history of weaponizing food access in the Gaza Strip via the destruction of Palestinian agricultural land, labor restrictions and blockade, “controlling and managing the population through food insecurity.” Neve Gordon is a professor of human rights law and author of multiple books on Israel’s occupation of Palestine whose latest essay for The New York Review of Books is titled “The Road to Famine in Gaza.” Now as aid deliveries dry up amid fears of further attacks on humanitarian workers, Gordon emphasizes that “Israel has been controlling the food basket and using it as a weapon since the beginning of the occupation until today.”
Full interview here
Transform defence for sustainable human safety 