The Palestinian child Fadi Al-Zant sits crying on one of the beds of the field hospital set up by the International Medical Corps in the city of Rafah, south of Gaza. Symptoms of acute malnutrition appear on his face and his body, which has become emaciated and thin.
The child Fadi, who is 6 years old, was receiving treatment at Kamal Adwan Hospital in Gaza City with 22 other children, but they were evacuated from that hospital before they were transferred from Rafah to Egypt to receive treatment.
Fadi’s family surrounds him inside one of the field hospital tents – which a World Food Program team visited – in an attempt to comfort him. His mother, Shaima Al-Zant, says, “There is no longer any simple necessities of life in Gaza. There are no vegetables, meat, or fruits.”
She added, “My son was deprived of these things, and his body became emaciated, greatly weakened, and dehydrated. He also suffered from cystic fibrosis in his chest, which affected his health condition.”
The World Food Program warned that famine is imminent in northern Gaza, and that malnutrition among children is escalating at a record pace, with one in three children under the age of two suffering from severe malnutrition or wasting.
According to the program, parents in Gaza sometimes do not eat for several days until their children can, and that about 70% of the population in the north faces catastrophic hunger.
Inside the International Medical Corps hospital, other children were crying, their emaciated arms wearing red ribbons indicating they were suffering from severe malnutrition.
The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) report issued in March reported that the threshold for acute food insecurity for the famine had been significantly crossed, and that acute malnutrition among children under five years of age was progressing at a record pace towards the second threshold of famine.
It was noticed by Matthew Hollingsworth, acting country director of the World Food Program in Palestine, who visited Gaza earlier this month and met many “angry, tired and desperate people because their children go to bed hungry every night. About the assistance they need to survive.
In front of the rubble of a building that was destroyed in the war, Hollingworth, speaking from Gaza City, which he described as the epicenter of the crisis in the Strip, said, “There is no other place in the world where this large number of people are facing imminent famine.”
The UN official added, “We simply do not receive enough aid to Gaza City and the northern Strip.”
