Israel denying food to Gaza is weapon of war

By Faith Barbara N Ruhinda Updated at 1456 EAT on Tuesday 13 May 2025

Beleaguered Palestinian colleagues in Gaza are doing that, still doing invaluable reporting at great risk to themselves. More than 200 have been killed doing their jobs.

Israel does not allow international journalists into Gaza.

Denied the chance of eyewitness reporting one of the best tools of the job we can study, from a distance, the assessments of aid organisations operating in Gaza.

Pascal Hundt, deputy director of operations at the International Committee of the Red Cross said last week that civilians in Gaza faced an overwhelming daily struggle to survive the dangers of hostilities.

But it might, if Israel continues the plunge deeper into war that resumed on 18 March when it broke a two-month ceasefire with a massive series of air strikes.

Israel had already sealed the gates of Gaza. Since the beginning of March, it has blocked all shipments of humanitarian aid, including food and medical supplies.

The return to war ended any chance of moving on to the ceasefire’s proposed second phase, which Israel and Hamas had agreed would end with the release of all the remaining hostages in exchange for a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza.

That was unacceptable to the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and the ultra-nationalist religious extremists who keep him in power.

They want Gaza’s Palestinians to be replaced by Jewish settlers.

They threatened to topple Netanyahu’s government if he did not go back to war, and the end of Netanyahu’s political career would bring the day of reckoning for his part in Israel’s failure to prevent the deadly Hamas attacks on 7 October 2023. It might also force a conclusion in his long trial on corruption charges.

Prime Minister Netanyahu is now promising a new intense offensive into Gaza in the days after President Donald Trump finishes his swing through the wealthy Arab oil monarchies in the Gulf later this week.

The offensive includes a plan to displace massive numbers of Palestinian civilians on top of waves of artillery, air strikes and death.

It means families having only handfuls of minutes to flee for their lives, from an area that might be hit immediately to one that might be hit later. Hundreds of thousands have done so repeatedly since the war began.

Gaza was one of the most overcrowded places on earth before the war. Israel’s plan is to force as many Gazans as possible into a tiny area in the south, near the ruins of the town of Rafah, which has been almost entirely destroyed.

Before that happens, the UN humanitarian office estimates that 70% of Gaza is already effectively off limits to Palestinians. Israel’s plan is toleave them in an even smaller area.

The UN and leading aid groups reject Israeli claims that Hamas steals and controls food that comes into Gaza. They have refused to cooperate with a scheme proposed by Israel and the US that would use private security firms, protected by Israeli troops, to distribute basic rations.

Far from Gaza, in London, I talked to Philippe Lazzarini, the commissioner-general of Unrwa, the UN agency that supports Palestinian refugees. He told me that he was running out of words “to describe the misery and the tragedy affecting the people in Gaza. They have been now more than two months without any aid”.

Starvation is spreading, people are exhausted, people are hungry… we can expect that in the coming weeks if no aid is coming in, that people will not die because of the bombardment, but they will die because of the lack of food. This is the weaponisation of humanitarian aid.

If words are not enough, look at the most authoritative data-driven assessment of famine and food emergencies in the regular reports issued by Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, or IPC. It is a joint venture by UN agencies, aid groups and governments that measures whether a famine is happening.

The latest IPC update says Gaza is close to famine. But it says that the entire population, more than two million people, almost half of whom are children, is experiencing acute food insecurity. In plain English, that means they are being starved by Israel’s blockade.

The allegation that the total denial of food to Gazan civilians is more evidence of an Israeli genocide against Palestinians has outraged Benjamin Netanyahu, his government and many Israeli citizens.

It produced rare political unity in Israel. The leader of the opposition Yair Lapid, normally a stern critic of Netanyahu, condemned “a moral collapse and a moral disaster” at the ICJ.

Genocide is defined as the destruction, in whole or in part, of a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. The International Criminal Court (ICC), a separate body, has issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and his former defence minister on war crimes charges, which they reject. The three Hamas leaders who were also the subject of ICC warrants have all been killed by Israel.

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