The UN has warned of starvation if food deliveries are not significantly boosted, and the father of Ali, a Palestinian infant boy who recently passed away from hunger and dehydration at the lone pediatric facility in northern Gaza, has made an appeal for assistance for the other children receiving care there.
“In an interview taped for BBC Arabic’s Gaza Lifeline radio service, the man, who wished to remain anonymous, stated that his kidneys failed because Ali was born during a time of war and his mother had no food or anything to eat.”
“Every day Ali’s life grew more difficult. Hospitals were contacted in an attempt to treat him, but no assistance was given. Ali passed away in front of the world, which never stopped observing him.”
Sadly, during a visit over the weekend, a World Health Organization team reported that at least ten children had passed away at the overcrowded Kamal Adwan hospital in the town of Beit Lahia due to malnourishment. Ali was one of them.
Since last week, 18 children have died throughout the territory from starvation and dehydration, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry, with at least 15 of those deaths occurring at Kamal Adwan. Additionally, it has voiced concerns for six infants who it claims are receiving malnutrition treatment at the hospital.
Unicef, the UN agency that works with children, has issued a warning, stating that until the conflict between Israel and Hamas is resolved and barriers to humanitarian relief issues are resolved right away.
According to Gaza’s health ministry, women and children account for 70% of the more than 30,700 individuals who have died and 72,000 injured in the region since the conflict began.
In response to Hamas’s strikes on Israel on October 7, which resulted in about 1,200 deaths and 253 hostages, the Israeli military initiated an air and ground campaign in Gaza.
The World Food Programme reports that hunger in northern Gaza, where an estimated 300,000 people are currently trapped due to the inability of aid to penetrate beyond a trickle, has reached catastrophic proportions.
One in six of the children under two who were screened for malnutrition in January by UN agencies were found to be very malnourished. Almost 3 percent of those kids had severe wasting and needed immediate medical attention.
In addition to the stress and trauma brought on by the battle, mothers’ inability to breastfeed their children is further hampered by the absence of wholesome food, clean water, and medical facilities. Babies can rapidly become extremely malnourished and dehydrated in the absence of breast milk or formula, which is said to be nearly impossible to find in the north. This raises the danger of potentially fatal illnesses like kidney failure.
In an interview with Gaza Lifeline, Dr. Samia Abdel Jalil, who oversees Kamal Adwan’s critical care unit, revealed that a baby girl and her elder sister passed away at the hospital a few days apart.
“We had difficulty in obtaining milk for the entire department and not just for that little girl,” she said. “She died without getting her small dose of milk.”
One of the very ill children that Dr. Abdel Jalil and her colleagues are attempting to treat with the few resources at their disposal is Salah Samara, a four-month-old boy.
According to his mother, he was born too soon and suffered from severe dehydration. He currently has chronic kidney disease and urinary retention, which can be very uncomfortable and cause bloating in the abdomen.
The things that are going on with him are really hurting my heart. Seeing your child cry every day because he can’t urinate is incredibly painful, especially when the physicians are powerless to help.”
“He has the right to receive treatment and has the right to everything else, by virtue of being a child at the beginning of his life,” she said.
“Every day, [his] condition worsens. He desperately requires medical attention abroad. Anybody who hears me out will hopefully assist in caring for my child.
However, the World Food Programme (WFP) reported on Tuesday that Israeli forces had obstructed its first attempt in the past two weeks to deliver food aid to the northern Gaza region. The 14-truck convoy was “turned back” at a checkpoint, according to the UN agency, and then throngs of “desperate people” stole from them. For comment, the IDF has been contacted by the BBC.
According to the Israeli Defense Ministry agency in charge of organizing assistance access in Gaza, “We will continue expanding our humanitarian efforts to the civilian population in Gaza while we fulfil our goals of freeing Gaza from Hamas and our hostages from Hamas.”
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