As Israel's severe restrictions on aid entering Gaza drain essential supplies, displaced Palestinians told CNN they are struggling to feed their children.
Starving mothers are unable to produce enough milk to breastfeed their babies, doctors say. Parents arrive at overwhelmed health facilities begging for infant formula.
Gaza's entire population of roughly 2.2 million people are facing "crisis or worse levels of acute food insecurity," according to the World Food Programme, which warns child malnutrition in the enclave is "higher than anywhere in the world." Two newborn baby girls died due to malnutrition and dehydration in northern Gaza on Monday, Dr. Samer Libd, a pediatrician at the Kamal Adwan Hospital, told CNN.
Israel insists there is "no limit" on the amount of aid that can enter Gaza, but its inspection regime on aid trucks has meant that only a tiny fraction of the amount of food and other supplies that used to enter Gaza daily before the war is getting in now. Last month, at least 118 people were killed while trying to access food aid in Gaza City in one of the worst single tragedies of the war so far.
Jamie McGoldrick, a UN humanitarian coordinator who returned from a two-day trip to Gaza, warned that hunger there has reached "catastrophic levels." Adele Khodr, regional director of the UNICEF office in the Middle East and North Africa, said "people are hungry, exhausted and traumatized. Many are clinging to life."
Israel launched its military offensive in Gaza after the militant group Hamas killed at least 1,200 people and kidnapped more than 250 others in southern Israel on October 7.
