Gaza
By Abayomi Grace
The United Nations has officially declared a famine in Gaza, marking the first time a famine has been declared in the Middle East. According to the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification Initiative (IPC), famine has been confirmed in Gaza City, which covers about 20% of the Gaza Strip, as of August 15, 2025. The IPC notes that approximately 500,000 people are facing “catastrophic” hunger, with this number expected to increase to nearly 641,000 people by the end of September.
The famine is attributed to a sharp escalation in the war between Israel and Hamas, resulting in massive displacement of people and severe restriction of access to humanitarian and commercial supplies of food. The local food system has collapsed, with an estimated 98% of cropland in the Gaza Strip either damaged, inaccessible, or both. Livestock has been decimated, and fishing is banned. The health system has severely deteriorated, while access to safe drinking water and adequate hygiene has been drastically reduced.
UN aid chief Tom Fletcher said the famine was entirely preventable, blaming Israel for obstructing food aid. “It is a famine that we could have prevented if we had been allowed. Yet food stacks up at borders because of systematic obstruction by Israel,” he told reporters. Fletcher emphasized that the famine should “haunt us all”.
The IPC defines famine as occurring when 20% of households have an extreme lack of food, 30% of children under five are acutely malnourished, and at least two in every 10,000 people die daily from outright starvation or from malnutrition and disease. The UN Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, has renewed calls for an immediate ceasefire and full humanitarian access to Gaza, emphasizing that “we cannot allow this situation to continue with impunity”.
Children are particularly hard hit by the lack of food, with over 12,000 children identified as acutely malnourished in July alone – a six-fold increase since January. The International Red Cross has described the declaration of famine as “devastating and entirely foreseeable”. UN rights chief Volker Turk said “it is a war crime to use starvation as a method of warfare.
The situation is dire, with the famine projected to expand to Deir el-Balah and Khan Yunis governorates by the end of September, covering around two-thirds of the Palestinian territory. Israel’s foreign ministry has denied the existence of a famine in Gaza, calling the report “based on Hamas lies laundered through organizations with vested interests.
