“We ate the donkey’s corn and barley.” Happy International Women’s Day

MAR 8

MARCH 8, 2024 JUDYHAIVENThanks for reading Judy Haiven’s Newsletter! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.

This is what one parent told the reporter from Al-Jazeera about how he fed his starving family, including four children. But those days are long gone. Now, the only thing available is grass.

Said Faraj Abu Naji, of northern Gaza, “Planes are dropping aid on northern Gaza, and we have become like dogs, running after a bone.”

Last Saturday, the US airdropped its first load: 66 bundles, which is food for 38,000 meals. If the food actually lands in the hands of Gazas, only 2% of Gazans received for that day. One airdrop is roughly the equivalent to one truckload.

Last airdrop was 38,000 meals

Before 7 Oct, more than 500 food trucks drove into Gaza every day – yesterday y there were 58. But over the last five months, on more than half the days there were no trucks at all.

Starvation is something we don’t really get. Yes, for years we have heard about starvation in parts of Africa. But officials tell us even in blighted areas of Central and West Africa, just 40-60% of the people will face possible starvation in the spring. UNICEF and the UN claim that getting food to them is almost “manageable”.

Some of us remember in 2006, a senior advisor to Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, said that Israeli wanted “to put the Palestinians on a diet, but not to make them die of hunger.” In 2012 it was revealed that as far back as 2008, Israeli authorities calculated that Gazans needed only 2,279 calories a day to avoid malnutrition. As a result, Israel then decided to limit the amount of food allowed into Gaza– without causing outright starvation.

Palestinians in Gaza are facing a hunger crisis

All of Gaza’s 2.2 million people are unable to meet their food needs. Since December, nearly 200,000 additional people are experiencing catastrophic levels of hunger, a category that now includes more than a quarter of the population.

Half are starving, and another quarter are one step away from famine. As one father asked, “What should we eat, should we eat grass?” Grass is not good for humans as this article explains.
A family of 8 got one camp container (ration) of food which was not enough to feed them one meal.

This is particularly shocking when we hear that 135,000 children in Gaza are under the age of two. Officials for UNICEF say one in six children under age two has been starved, and the damage is irreversible. Malnourishment means higher risk of heart disease in when they are in their 30s and 40s, higher risk of strokes, higher risk of cognitive impairment and liver disease. According to pediatricians, if under-twos are malnourished, they start to lose all their body fat, then their organs start to fail the kidneys, the liver, the brain, the heart—the brain and heart are last to go. Then they starve to death.

*This photo is from December, 2023; international aid agencies say Gaza is suffering from shortages of food [credit: Fatima Shbair/AP]*

Dr Omar Abdel-Mannan is a British-Egyptian pediatric neurologist. He and Gaza Medic Voices, a group of doctors started to travel to the West Bank to help victims of Israeli aggression twelve years go. In the last few years, they have been helping save lives in Gaza. What Dr Abdel-Mannan noted is that children’s deaths are not so related to injuries from missiles, drones and blasts. Children’s “deaths are completely preventable and are from diarrhea, gastroenteritis, chest infections, and pneumonia. Their immune systems are so weak they can’t cope.”

Even when they can get a bit of food in the drops, after a child’s body has been in starvation mode for weeks, there is a high risk for “refeeding syndrome,” if the child eats too much, too fast. “There are dangerous shifts in fluids, electrolytes which can result in heart failure, lung, liver and brain damage that result in coma and death,” according to Dr Abdel-Mannam. He insists that giving dropped food aid to children with no management plan with a doctor or dietician can cause more harm than good.

The World Health Organization (WHO) fears that the 10 child starvation deaths in hospitals in the last days are just the tip of the iceberg.

Dr Abdel-Mannan notes , “The Americans drop aid like a stunt – they give Israel billions in military aid” and drop a fraction of money into food drops. “It is dystopian” and beggars belief. Just to get the food aid, Palestinians are shot at by occupiers.

He said, “As an occupying force, Israel is responsible for food, water, health care and education. But Israel is exterminating them.”

Doctors who work with Dr Abdel-Mannan have said it’s dehumanizing for Gazans to pick up bread from the ocean. Doctors noted, “We don’t want food or water from the West; we don’t want your prayers, your thoughts, your pity. We just want a ceasefire. We want to stop being bombed and live like human beings.” Dropping food packages adds insult to injury.

Happy International Women’s Day

ITEM: On 29 Feb, US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin confirmed that 25,000 women and children in Gaza have been killed by Israel since 7 Oct. .

ITEM: On 29 Feb, Austin said that the US has sent 21,000 preciion-guided munitions to Israel. This was in violation of International Law.

ITEM: On 29 Feb, Austin confirmed, “We provide munitions to allies and partners that they’ll use them in a responsible way.”

The Take on Al Jazeera has an excellent 19 minute podcast on starvation in Gaza here.

Image at the top: Parcels of food airdropped in South Sudan. Photo from the World Food Program, credit Peter Smerdon.

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