WARNING – DISTRESSING IMAGES: Severely weak Yezen Abu Ful, two, is among 70,000 children medics warn are now facing malnutrition – as a UN chief blasted the ‘indifference and inaction’ of global leaders over the Gaza slaughter
A starving child clings to his mum in an image victims in Gaza pray the world can no longer ignore.
Severely weak Yezen Abu Ful, two, is among 70,000 children medics warn are now facing malnutrition. UN chief Antonio Guterres blasted the “indifference and inaction” of global leaders over the Gaza slaughter, as children dying from hunger hit 122 since the war began. Keir Starmer vowed the UK will “pull every lever” to get vital aid into the Strip and added: “This humanitarian catastrophe must end.”
Pitiful cries for help ring out from the depths of despair in Gaza, calling to a world that appears to have stood by and watched the hell of slaughter and starvation unfold. And as yet more horrific images of emaciated children on the brink of death emerge, the call for action to end the suffering of Palestinians in the face of relentless Israeli attacks and blockades grows.
In one haunting image, Muhammed Zakariya Ayyub al-Matouk – a tragic sight of skin and bones – clings to his desperate mum in a tent in Gaza City where there is no access to milk, food, or basic necessities. The one-and-a-half-year-old is just one of an estimated 70,000 children said by medics to be in a state of starvation – and up to 28 are believed to be dying every day.
Gaza’s hospitals yesterday reported nine more deaths from hunger in 24 hours, bringing the total to 122 since the war started. In another harrowing picture, Yezen Abu Ful, two, lies helpless at the Al-Shati Refugee Camp, waiting for food many know may never come until it is too late.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged the world not to ignore the crisis. He said: “I cannot explain the level of indifference and inaction we see by too many in the international community. The lack of compassion, the lack of truth, the lack of humanity.”
Gaza-based journalist Noor al-Shana told how desperate Palestinians are “tired of empty expressions of solidarity” – as the death toll in the strip hit 59,587. She said: “We don’t want just words, we want actions. There are thousands of children dying now and no one is doing anything. The world is saying ‘Free Palestine’. We don’t want words, we want solutions.”
World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Israel’s actions in Gaza were causing “man-made mass starvation”. Parents are going without food themselves for days in a bid to save their stricken children.
Unicef and other agencies warned Gaza will run out of the therapeutic food needed to save the lives of severely malnourished children by mid-August unless aid is restored.
The disturbing scenes came as 221 cross-party MPs demanded Keir Starmer recognise Palestine as a state. But the PM resisted and, writing in the Mirror today, insisted such a move must be part of a wider “pathway to peace”. But amid the misery, there was a tiny glimmer of hope, as triplets born in April continue to grow.
Mum Alaa, 31, and 36-year-old husband Louay feared she would miscarry the tots due to the stress of Israeli airstrikes. The couple, who also have children Alma, seven, and two-year-old Ahmed, had to move three times due to the attacks or military orders – once while she was heavily pregnant. Alaa said: “We ran in silence. I prayed my babies wouldn’t slip away while I escaped death.”
With help from an Islamic Relief project, their little girls Israa, Ayla and Aylol were born underweight but alive. Alaa added: “They are my miracle. My proof that even in war, life insists on being born.” But the babies and their mother could still face problems if they need any more medical care, equipment and drugs fast running out due to the Israeli blockade.
Pregnant women are now too malnourished to stand, and even doctors are facing starvation. The women are having operations without anaesthetics. Nurses have to squeeze three or four babies into a single incubator. Doctors have reported a huge increase in miscarriages. Medics at hospitals such as Al Awda in northern Gaza are risking their lives to keep services going.
More than 1,500 health workers have been killed while half of all hospitals have had to shut down. Aid workers, too, are suffering from a lack of food. The UN claims at least 100,000 Palestinians are starving.
President Emmanuel Macron said France will recognise Palestine as a state immediately, piling pressure on Mr Starmer. A third of MPs in the Commons signed the letter to the PM demanding he follow suit. Charities have demanded Israel allow the UN to distribute aid, which they said is sitting outside Gaza.
They called for the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which is responsible for what little aid is getting through, to be shut down amid deaths at food queues. GHF insists those tragedies never happened at its site and the Israeli military said troops have not fired on civilians.
Ceasefire talks appear to have stalled amid differing demands from Israel and Hamas, which sparked the war with its October 7 attack that killed 1, 200 people. The group also kidnapped 251, some of whom are still in captivity.