| Thomson Reuter Foundation | |
| By Sadiya Ansari | Contributor | |
| This newsletter contains images that may be disturbing. Harrowing images of malnourished children in Gaza have intensified international pressure on Israel to increase humanitarian aid to the enclave.This week, Hamas-run health authorities in Gaza said that 93 children were among the 180 people who have already died from hunger-related causes. These deaths come on top of more than 60,000 Palestinians, mostly civilians, the health authorities in Gaza say have been killed since Israel launched its military offensive in the strip in October 2023. Almost 470,000 people in Gaza are enduring famine-like conditions, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), with 90,000 women and children in need of specialist nutrition treatments. WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus described the situation as “mass starvation” that was “man-made”, laying the blame squarely at the Israeli blockade.While Israel has denied a policy of starvation, it controls most aspects of how food reaches and is distributed in Gaza. This includes access into Gaza, transport logistics and who is permitted to distribute aid. Today we’ll unpack the policy on aid entering the territory.  A Palestinian mother sits next to her malnourished son, at a school where they shelter amid a hunger crisis, in Gaza City, July 24, 2025. REUTERS/Mahmoud IssaThe policy Israel controls access into Gaza, including for humanitarian organisations, as a result of a blockade by land, air and sea<a | |
Thẻ: Israel’s crime
The mathematics of starvation: how Israel caused a famine in Gaza
Israel controls the flow of food into Gaza. It has calculated how many calories Palestinians need to stay alive. Its data shows only a fraction has been allowed in
Emma Graham-Harrison Chief Middle East correspondentThu 31 Jul 2025 15.49 BSTShare
The mathematics of famine are simple in Gaza. Palestinians cannot leave, war has ended farming and Israel has banned fishing, so practically every calorie its population eats must be brought in from outside.
Israel knows how much food is needed. It has been calibrating hunger in Gaza for decades, initially calculating shipments to exert pressure while avoiding starvation.
“The idea is to put the Palestinians on a diet, but not to make them die of hunger,” a senior adviser to the then prime minister, Ehud Olmert, said in 2006. An Israeli court ordered the release of documents showing the details of those macabre sums two years later.
Cogat, the Israeli agency that still controls aid shipments to Gaza, calculated then that Palestinians needed an average minimum 2,279 calories per person per day, which could be provided through 1.836kg of food.
Today, humanitarian organisations are asking for an even smaller minimum ration: 62,000 metric tonnes of dry and canned food to meet basic needs for 2.1 million people each month, or around 1kg of food per person per day.
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