Save the Children said that about 130,000 children under the age of ten have been trapped for 50 days in areas north of Gaza, without food or medical supplies.
According to the organization, supplies of food, water, and medicines to children living in northern Gaza and the Gaza governorates have been almost completely cut off since October 6, when Israeli forces declared the area “closed military.”
The organization stated that the Famine Review Committee, an independent body, had confirmed that famine in those areas was “either imminent or likely to occur.”
The United Nations also warned nearly a month ago that the population of the entire northern Gaza governorate “is at risk of death,” but according to the organization, Israeli forces “repeatedly rejected attempts by relief groups to reach the area.”
The organization complained that it had been unable to reach northern Gaza to deliver food parcels to 5,000 families, along with 725 hygiene kits and other supplies, for 7 weeks.
The organization said that medical supplies to the region had stopped and “the recent polio vaccination campaign did not reach about 10,000 children in Jabalia, Beit Lahia and Beit Hanoun at all.”
The organization indicated that many families in northern Gaza were trapped because they were unable to escape, either because of the presence of elderly or disabled people among them, or because of the lack of alternative options in other parts of Gaza.
Parents in northern Gaza told Save the Children that they felt “suffocated,” with “no energy left in our bodies.”
Save the Children said that children are the ones bearing the brunt of the war in Gaza. According to the United Nations, about 44% of the martyrs are children.
The organization attributed Ruba, a mother of two children, who lives in northern Gaza, to say: “I am trapped with my children under relentless bombs, missiles, and bullets, and there is no place to run to. My mother is paralyzed, and I cannot leave her behind. My brother was killed, and my husband was captured, and I do not know whether “Our house was destroyed above our heads, and we survived by a miracle.”
She added: “We were left without food, without clean water, and in constant fear. My two children developed a rash, and my daughter was bleeding, but there is no medicine, no help, and I cannot do anything at all.”
Jeremy Stoner, regional director of Save the Children, said that the situation in northern Gaza is “unsuitable for human life, and yet we know that there are about 130,000 children under the age of ten trapped in these conditions,” pointing out that “the war in Gaza is a war on children”.