Geneva - Saba:
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said on Sunday that the situation in the Gaza Strip “is no longer an imminent hunger crisis but a full-blown famine.”
This came in a statement by OCHA’s head in Geneva, Ramesh Rajasingham, before the UN Security Council during an emergency session on the Middle East, focusing on the Palestinian issue and the Israeli decision to implement a plan to fully occupy Gaza.
Rajasingham said the suffering endured by Palestinians over the past 22 months “has been nothing short of soul-crushing, and our shared humanity demands that we end this catastrophe immediately.”
He added that Israel’s decision to fully occupy the Gaza Strip “marks a dangerous escalation in a conflict that has already caused unimaginable suffering.”
The OCHA chief reiterated, “The situation in Gaza is no longer an imminent hunger crisis but a full-blown famine,” stressing that “Israel must stop the arbitrary detention of Palestinians in the West Bank and facilitate the entry of aid into the Gaza Strip.”
Palestinians in Gaza are facing an unprecedented wave of hunger since Israel closed the Strip’s border crossings in early March, imposing severe restrictions on the entry of food, relief supplies, fuel, and medicine.
With U.S. and European backing, the Israeli army has continued since October 7, 2023, to commit acts of genocide in Gaza, killing 61,430 Palestinian civilians—most of them children and women—and wounding 153,213 others, in what remains an incomplete toll as thousands of victims are still trapped under the rubble and in the streets, beyond the reach of ambulance and rescue teams.
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