• UN announcement is only the fifth-ever official declaration of famine, and the first outside Africa
• Hunger monitor says similar conditions expected in Deir el-Balah and Khan Yunis by next month
• Hamas demands opening of Gaza crossings after UN, IPC declaration
• Israel cries foul as world holds it responsible for ‘man-made’ calamity
ROME: The United Nations on Friday officially declared a famine in Gaza City, the first time it has done so in the Middle East, with experts warning that over half a million people faced catastrophic hunger.
“It is a famine: the Gaza famine,” said Tom Fletcher, the UN’s emergency relief coordinator, as the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) panel found famine was now present in and around Gaza City.
He blamed Israel, accusing it of “systematic obstruction” of aid deliveries to the war-ravaged Palestinian territory.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu slammed the UN-backed report as “an outright lie”, while the foreign ministry insisted: “There is no famine in Gaza.”
The IPC defines famine as occurring when 20 per cent of households have an extreme lack of food; 30pc 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.
UN agencies have long been warning of the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza, particularly as Israel steps up its offensive in the besieged and war-torn enclave.
The Rome-based IPC said that “as of 15 August 2025, famine (IPC Phase 5) — with reasonable evidence — is confirmed in Gaza governorate”.
The UN estimates that nearly one million people currently live in the Gaza governorate.
It was the first time the IPC has recorded famine outside of Africa, and the global group predicted that famine conditions would spread to the central and southern areas of Deir al-Balah and Khan Yunis by the end of next month.
The IPC previously concluded that there was famine in areas of Somalia in 2011, South Sudan in 2017 and 2020, and Sudan in 2024.
A famine was projected in Yemen in 2018, but never officially confirmed, despite the humanitarian crisis in the country.
‘Man-made’
According to figures from Gaza’s Health Ministry, verified by the World Health Organisation, deaths from malnutrition and starvation are spiking.
In the first seven months of the year, 89 fatalities were attributed to malnutrition or starvation, mostly children and teens. Just in August, there have been at least 138 deaths, including 25 minors, the ministry said on Friday.
The IPC said the famine in Gaza was “entirely man-made”, driven by a sharp escalation of the conflict in July, massive displacement of people since mid-March and restricted access to food.
In early March, Israel completely banned aid supplies from Gaza, before allowing very limited quantities to enter at the end of May, leading to severe shortages of food, medicine and fuel.
Speaking to reporters in Geneva, Fletcher said the famine should “haunt us all”.
“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 said.
UN rights chief Volker Turk said “it is a war crime to use starvation as a method of warfare”.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres renewed calls for an immediate ceasefire and full humanitarian access to Gaza, adding: “We cannot allow this situation to continue with impunity.”
The International Red Cross described the declaration of famine as “devastating and entirely foreseeable”.
“Under international humanitarian law, Israel, as the occupying power, must ensure that the basic needs of the civilian population in Gaza are met,” it said in a statement.
Outrage
Hamas called on Friday for an immediate end to the war in Gaza and the lifting of the Israeli siege on the territory.
In a statement published online, the group called for “immediate action by the UN and the security council to stop the war and lift the siege” and demanded that crossings be opened “without restrictions to allow the urgent and continuous entry of food, medicine, water and fuel”.
It said the declaration by the UN confirmed the “humanitarian catastrophe” in Gaza — but lamented that it came far too late.
Britain’s Foreign Secretary David Lammy on Friday condemned the famine in Gaza as a “moral outrage” and a “man-made catastrophe”.
Calling it “utterly horrifying and wholly preventable”, he called on Israel to take urgent action to remedy the situation.
“We are seeing the worst possible humanitarian catastrophe that we can even measure,” said Jeanette Bailey, a child nutrition lead at the International Rescue Committee, a New York-based aid organisation.
‘Too weak to cry’
In July alone, more than 12,000 children were identified as acutely malnourished – a six-fold increase since January, according to UN agencies.
“The signs were unmistakable: children with wasted bodies, too weak to cry or eat, babies dying from hunger and preventable disease,” said Unicef Executive Director Catherine Russell.
The local food system has collapsed, with an estimated 98pc of cropland in the Gaza Strip either damaged, inaccessible or both, the IPC said.
Meanwhile, livestock is decimated and fishing is banned.
The IPC said conditions in the North Gaza Governorate, north of Gaza City, may well be worse, but said it did not have enough data.
Published in Dawn, August 23rd, 2025