Gaza Hunger: 73 killed as US-backed Foundation faces scrutiny

Gaza Hunger: 73 killed as US-backed Foundation faces scrutiny
2025-07-20T17:22:32+00:00

Shafaq News – Gaza

73 Palestinians died on Sunday while waiting for aid trucks in Gaza, according to the Health Ministry, as calls intensified to lift Israel’s blockade and reassess the role of the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. 

The ministry confirmed over 150 injuries—many critical—during the rush for food, with 18 starvation deaths in the past 24 hours, bringing the total to 86 since the war began, including 76 children. It placed the overall toll from Israeli attacks at 58,895 killed and 140,980 wounded.

Footage aired by local media showed emaciated residents collapsing near aid trucks and bodies being transported instead of food. “They went out hungry and died hungry,” one resident told reporters.

The growing number of starvation deaths has drawn mounting condemnation and urgent appeals to end the siege. In a joint statement, Palestinian factions accused Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government of waging a “deliberate war of starvation” aimed at forcing mass displacement. “This is a systematic campaign of extermination,” the statement charged, describing the siege as a violation of international humanitarian law and the Geneva Conventions.

The factions also pointed to the role of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which took over aid coordination in May. Since then, multiple aid distribution sites have come under fire, with nearly 1,000 Palestinians reportedly killed while trying to access food. Critics argue that aid is no longer being delivered safely and that its control has become part of the crisis, not the solution.

Meanwhile, the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor documented 42 cases of severe malnutrition within just six hours, mostly involving children, elderly, and pregnant women. The group described the situation as “suffocating starvation policy against over 2 million Palestinians,” calling on the organization to halt its operations over its “role in killing.”

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) warned of a worsening humanitarian crisis, referring to the conditions as a “manmade” famine. The agency confirmed it has been banned from delivering food into Gaza for over four months, despite having the capacity to distribute aid safely and at scale. “People are going without meals for days. Prices have soared more than 4,000 percent. One million children are among those starving,” the agency warned.

While demanding that Israel lift the siege and allow full humanitarian access, it dismissed the Israeli-American aid distribution effort as ineffective. “The current distribution of food by the Israeli-American so-called ‘Gaza Humanitarian Fund’ does not work,” the agency stated.

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