Famine in Gaza?

[GeneralMacArthur]

For a couple months now, we've been hearing that a famine in Gaza is "impending" or "imminent" or that Gaza is "teetering on the verge" of famine or some variation of this.

We have also seen the Biden Administration / liberal consensus, which tries to appease the base without abandoning Israel, become "Israel should defeat Hamas, but they've handled the war terribly and in particular they need to do way better on aid and let way more aid in."

I've also noticed that the "Genocide Joe" crowd have switched their claim from:
"Israel is committing a genocide by slaughtering Palestinians en masse"
to
"Israel is committing a genocide by starving the Palestinians to death"
largely because, as I have noted elsewhere, there has been a sharp decline in Gaza deaths, to the point where as of March 28 the number is about 32,000 but it passed 30,000 in February, so we are now averaging well below 100 deaths/day, whereas at the beginning of the conflict it was close to 500/day.  This is putting aside the fact that the methodology for counting/reporting deaths has changed as the war has progressed and now most death counts are based on hearsay rather than actual casualty reports.

All of this begs the question, is there actually an aid crisis / impending famine in Gaza?

Now as I wrote a week ago, the most reliable poll we have from Gaza shows that 96% of Palestinians have access to food/water.  But this didn't convince many people, because it's just a poll -- that's soft data, anyone can dismiss it by just deciding the methodology must have been wrong.  That is after all Atlas's favorite habit.

I've long said that I would like more hard data from this war, and today I discovered that hard data on aid does exist -- from, of all sources, the UNRWA.  Today, for instance, 206 trucks of aid entered Gaza.

I was going to do the math on this, but a Reddit post beat me to it, so I will summarize here.

The UNWRA source above says 11944/17839 trucks that have gone into Gaza have been food trucks, or about 67%.

The United Nations says that every food truck is 20 tons of food.

Let's say Gaza is getting around 200 trucks per day, 67% of them being 20-ton food trucks.  So that is (200 * 20 * 0.67) = 2,680 tons of food per day.  The most recent estimated population of the Gaza Strip was 2,375,259 people.  So that averages out to (2,000 * 2,680 / 2,375,259) = 2.25lbs of food aid per person per day.

Is that enough?  Well, we have to take a closer look at what the food is.  The World Food Programme breaks it down into 32% flour, 21% frozen meat as the top two items.  Let's say that's 0.72lbs flour, 0.5lbs meat per person.  I asked Google for some calculations and got that this is about 1,200 calories of flour and about 250 calories of meat (I put in lamb).  So even at only half of the aid accounted for, we're already at nearly 1,500 calories per person.

What to make of this?

Well, you guys probably know what I'm going to say.  The narrative that Israel is starving the Palestinians is totally false, and the narrative that Israel needs to "do more to get aid into Gaza" is just a cheap shot people are using so they can criticize Israel without criticizing the war on Hamas.  These work because nobody is actually looking at the facts.  If you do look at the facts and do the math, based on figures provided by the U.N. itself, you see that actually, at its current rate, Israel is providing a sufficient amount of food to the Gazans.

Which makes sense, because we've been hearing for months now that Gaza will enter famine any day now, yet the Gazans themselves report that they're fine on food/water access, and every piece of footage we see of Gaza backs this up as the Gazans don't ever seem malnourished.

It's all well and good to lie about Israel/Gaza.  I mean, we all hate Israel, what's a few lies here and there if it's all for a good cause?  Certainly Israel is no stranger to lying.

But as a popular TV show from the Trump administration put it... every lie we tell incurs a debt to the truth, and inevitably, that debt is paid.  Lying about Israel having a diabolical plan to intentionally starve the Gazans creates the false impression that Israel is culpable in a Holodomor-style genocide, when Israel is not.  This is our debt to the truth.  And it will be paid in November, when millions of young people talk each other out of voting for Joe Biden because they were fooled by our lies into believing that he allowed a genocide to take place, resulting in the return to office of President Donald J. Trump.

[Silent Hunter]

I would say it very much depends on the area. Some parts of Gaza will be far better off than others. There is an awful lot of the place where there is no real news of what is going on.

[GeneralMacArthur]

I would say it very much depends on the area. Some parts of Gaza will be far better off than others. There is an awful lot of the place where there is no real news of what is going on.

Which place in Gaza do you think is specifically not getting enough food?  The math demonstrates that if food were distributed evenly, every Gazan would have sufficient food based solely on aid and nothing else.

If some Gazans aren't getting enough food, that would imply other Gazans are hoarding more food than they need...... hmmmm..... wonder which group that might be.

[Ⓐnarchy in the ☭☭☭P!]

https://twitter.com/AJEnglish/status/1773447469701173454

[GoTfan]

Just go and join the Republican Party already.

[Devout Centrist]

Why would we have *any* reason to believe food aid is distributed evenly in Gaza? Gaza is an active war zone and getting enough food to millions of people day in and day out is a Herculean effort. Aid trucks only solve 1 part of the supply chain issue, you have to get the food through border crossings, offload it at centralized locations, distribute it to aid kitchens and households, etc.

[lfromnj]

Why would we have *any* reason to believe food aid is distributed evenly in Gaza? Gaza is an active war zone and getting enough food to millions of people day in and day out is a Herculean effort. Aid trucks only solve 1 part of the supply chain issue, you have to get the food through border crossings, offload it at centralized locations, distribute it to aid kitchens and households, etc.

I mean we do know according to Gazan propaganda that someone is taking all the aid packages and selling them around. I don't know who it could be other than other Gazans.

[Devout Centrist]

I mean we do know according to Gazan propaganda that someone is taking all the aid packages and selling them around. I don't know who it could be other than other Gazans.

That's part of the problem, certainly, but it's made much worse by the massive logistical difficulties transporting and distributing aid to millions of people in a war zone. Even without Hamas hoarding supplies and some people selling food for a profit, it would still be a monumental challenge.

[Hindsight was 2020]

Starving baby Israel's fault

The well-groomed, well-fed Palestinian doctor with the dashing high fade says it's because there's no formula milk.  Why is the World Food Programme, which organizes the food trucks, not giving them formula milk?  Is the WFP committing genocide?

This is really disingenuous and disgusting

[It’s so Joever]

Starving baby Israel's fault

The well-groomed, well-fed Palestinian doctor with the dashing high fade says it's because there's no formula milk.  Why is the World Food Programme, which organizes the food trucks, not giving them formula milk?  Is the WFP committing genocide?

You have literally zero clue the doctor is “well fed”. A loss of body weight of five pounds due to lack of food is hardly noticeable on the average adult. A loss of five pounds for a baby would result in their likely near death. Yes I am aware they have different intake requirements but still, the doctor has years of fat reserves whereas the baby is literally just born. We see this type of stuff in Yemen and other famine zones all the time, stop being such a d**che and take a second to think before you type.

[It’s so Joever]

I mean we do know according to Gazan propaganda that someone is taking all the aid packages and selling them around. I don't know who it could be other than other Gazans.

That's part of the problem, certainly, but it's made much worse by the massive logistical difficulties transporting and distributing aid to millions of people in a war zone. Even without Hamas hoarding supplies and some people selling food for a profit, it would still be a monumental challenge.

If GMac had made the claim it’s Hamas exacerbating the famine, he would have had a fair enough point. Instead he decided to jump to this illogical conclusion which goes against what reliable sources on the ground are saying themselves all based on a single poll with questionable collection in the middle of a war??

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

I suppose the OP is going to claim that Oxfam hates Israel and is pro Hamas.

Gaza hunger figures “worst on record” - says Oxfam
Published: 18th March 2024

Latest IPC findings show that Famine is projected to occur anytime between now and May 2024 in the northern governorates of Gaza and North Gaza. Read the Famine Review Committee report and the full IPC's Gaza Report  

In the IPC’s five-tier classification of food crises, Gaza now has the largest percentage of a population to receive its most severe rating (IPC phase 5 - catastrophe) since the body began reporting in 2004. It has also never been recorded that an entire population (or 100%) be in IPC Phase 3 or worse.

https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/gaza-hunger-figures-worst-record-says-oxfam

Obviously Gaza is receiving some aid and had stocks of food prior to the war. Also, some subsistence food types that would normally be tended have grown wild.

When Russians experienced potential famine in the late 1990s, many survived by eating food they had planted in their dachas. Of course, Gaza is much more urban.

[GeneralMacArthur]

Starving baby Israel's fault

The well-groomed, well-fed Palestinian doctor with the dashing high fade says it's because there's no formula milk.  Why is the World Food Programme, which organizes the food trucks, not giving them formula milk?  Is the WFP committing genocide?

This is really disingenuous and disgusting

I did get the organization wrong.  WFP is not handling baby formula.  That's being handled by UNICEF.  And Israel is not preventing them from delivering formula to Gaza.

The Israeli government says that 530 tons of baby formula have been delivered since the start of the war.  I know everyone reading this will immediately jump to saying "lol you're gonna believe Israel?" and the answer is yes, because nobody has provided any reason to believe this isn't true other than a generic "Israel lies", and because it aligns with the aid numbers that have been reported by UNICEF itself and aligns with the other aid delivered.

https://twitter.com/cogatonline/status/1770723088608497740?s=20

530 tons is about 1 million pounds.  The average baby needs 1.5oz of formula every 3 hours, or 12oz per day, which is 0.75 lbs.  The U.N. says there are 20,000 babies in Gaza.  That's 15,000lbs of formula needed per day.  1,000,000lbs is enough to last about two months.  So I would say it isn't enough -- if all the babies were on formula.  But you can breastfeed as well.  I have no idea what the ratio of breastfed:formula babies in Gaza is, so that would determine whether or not the formula has been sufficient.  For instance if it was 50:50, so only 10,000 babies in Gaza need formula, then there has been enough supplied to last four months.

At any rate, there isn't such a severe formula deficiency that it would cause the degree of malnutrition seen in the video.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

Starving baby Israel's fault

The well-groomed, well-fed Palestinian doctor with the dashing high fade says it's because there's no formula milk.  Why is the World Food Programme, which organizes the food trucks, not giving them formula milk?  Is the WFP committing genocide?

This is really disingenuous and disgusting

530 tons is about 1 million pounds.  The average baby needs 1.5oz of formula every 3 hours, or 12oz per day, which is 0.75 lbs.  The U.N. says there are 20,000 babies in Gaza.  That's 15,000lbs of formula needed per day.  1,000,000lbs is enough to last about two months.  So I would say it isn't enough -- if all the babies were on formula.  But you can breastfeed as well.  I have no idea what the ratio of breastfed:formula babies in Gaza is, so that would determine whether or not the formula has been sufficient.  For instance if it was 50:50, so only 10,000 babies in Gaza need formula, then there has been enough supplied to last four months.

At any rate, there isn't such a severe formula deficiency that it would cause the degree of malnutrition seen in the video.

Define 'baby' because that's probably not what the U.N said.

This is what the U.N (UNICEF) said:
GENEVA, 19 January 2024 – “In the 105 days of this escalation in the Gaza Strip, nearly 20,000 babies have been born into war. That's a baby born into this horrendous war every 10 minutes.

So, is a person no longer a 'baby' after 3 1/2 months?

In British Columbia, the advice is to use baby formula for 9-12 months, which is considerably longer than 3 1/2 months.

Half of the population of Gaza is under 18, so hat there would be just 20,000 babies is absurd.

[GeneralMacArthur]

https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/gaza-hunger-figures-worst-record-says-oxfam

Once again, the report only says "famine is imminent in Northern Gaza."  These various U.N. agencies and NGOs have been crying wolf about this for months.

Here's an article by Human Rights Watch.  Israel: Starvation Used as Weapon of War in Gaza.

On November 17, the WFP warned of the “immediate possibility” of starvation, highlighting that supplies of food and water were practically non-existent. On December 3, it reported a “high risk of famine,” indicating that Gaza’s food system was on the brink of collapse. And on December 6, it declared that 48 percent of households in northern Gaza and 38 percent of displaced people in southern Gaza had experienced “severe levels of hunger.”

wait, hold up, what were those dates again?  November 17?  December 3?  December 6?  Gaza was "on the brink of collapse" and experiencing "severe levels of hunger" and supplies of food were "non-existent" and starvation was "immediate" more than four months ago?

Seriously, doesn't anyone else see any red flags with all this stuff?  This isn't an isolated example, we've been getting reports every week since the invasion started issuing similar dire warnings that widespread famine and death is just around the corner in Gaza... and then another couple weeks go by without it happening.

Meanwhile it's always accompanied by condemnations of Israel and allegations of "using starvation as a weapon of war", like this one from the Oxfam report:

Oxfam’s report today shows how Israel is causing these horrifying figures, by deliberately blocking food and aid from going into Gaza. It has been using starvation as a weapon of war for over five months now. The humanitarian situation in Gaza has actually worsened since the International Court of Justice (ICJ) specifically ordered Israel to enable more aid.  Israel’s deliberate manufacturing of suffering is systemic and of such scale and intensity that it creates a real risk of a genocide in Gaza.

I specifically want to highlight the part about Israel deliberately sending less aid after the ICJ "ordered" (lol) Israel to enable more aid.

Let's look at the actual facts -- the UNRWA's own data.  Here we go again.

https://app.powerbi.com/view?r=eyJrIjoiZTVkYmEwNmMtZWYxNy00ODhlLWI2ZjctNjIzMzQ5OGQxNzY5IiwidCI6IjI2MmY2YTQxLTIwZTktNDE0MC04ZDNlLWZkZjVlZWNiNDE1NyIsImMiOjl9&pageName=ReportSection3306863add46319dc574

back in December, the Kerem Shalom border crossing was closed and all aid went through Rafah.  So Gazans were getting about 100 trucks per day.  Starting in January the Kerem Shalom crossing opened and aid has increased to 150-200 trucks per day.  This is the UNRWA's own data, saying that aid has nearly doubled since December. 

[GeneralMacArthur]

Starving baby Israel's fault

The well-groomed, well-fed Palestinian doctor with the dashing high fade says it's because there's no formula milk.  Why is the World Food Programme, which organizes the food trucks, not giving them formula milk?  Is the WFP committing genocide?

This is really disingenuous and disgusting

530 tons is about 1 million pounds.  The average baby needs 1.5oz of formula every 3 hours, or 12oz per day, which is 0.75 lbs.  The U.N. says there are 20,000 babies in Gaza.  That's 15,000lbs of formula needed per day.  1,000,000lbs is enough to last about two months.  So I would say it isn't enough -- if all the babies were on formula.  But you can breastfeed as well.  I have no idea what the ratio of breastfed:formula babies in Gaza is, so that would determine whether or not the formula has been sufficient.  For instance if it was 50:50, so only 10,000 babies in Gaza need formula, then there has been enough supplied to last four months.

At any rate, there isn't such a severe formula deficiency that it would cause the degree of malnutrition seen in the video.

Define 'baby' because that's probably not what the U.N said.

This is what the U.N (UNICEF) said:
GENEVA, 19 January 2024 – “In the 105 days of this escalation in the Gaza Strip, nearly 20,000 babies have been born into war. That's a baby born into this horrendous war every 10 minutes.

So, is a person no longer a 'baby' after 3 1/2 months?

In British Columbia, the advice is to use baby formula for 9-12 months, which is considerably longer than 3 1/2 months.

Half of the population of Gaza is under 18, so hat there would be just 20,000 babies is absurd.

My bad, I didn't know babies needed formula for that long I thought they only needed it for at most the first six months or so.

In that case, again it depends on the breastfeed:formula ratio, but it's likely that the formula being provided is insufficient and UNICEF should organize more.  The deficiency would not be so severe that it would result in the kind of starvation we're seeing in the video, though.

And again, it's not like there's a mile of baby formula trucks backed up at the border waiting to get through, or Israeli soldiers going through aid trucks and taking the baby formula out so they can starve the babies, which is what people are implying when they say Israel is using starvation as a weapon of war.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/gaza-hunger-figures-worst-record-says-oxfam

Once again, the report only says "famine is imminent in Northern Gaza."  These various U.N. agencies and NGOs have been crying wolf about this for months.

Here's an article by Human Rights Watch.  Israel: Starvation Used as Weapon of War in Gaza.

On November 17, the WFP warned of the “immediate possibility” of starvation, highlighting that supplies of food and water were practically non-existent. On December 3, it reported a “high risk of famine,” indicating that Gaza’s food system was on the brink of collapse. And on December 6, it declared that 48 percent of households in northern Gaza and 38 percent of displaced people in southern Gaza had experienced “severe levels of hunger.”

wait, hold up, what were those dates again?  November 17?  December 3?  December 6?  Gaza was "on the brink of collapse" and experiencing "severe levels of hunger" and supplies of food were "non-existent" and starvation was "immediate" more than four months ago?

Seriously, doesn't anyone else see any red flags with all this stuff?  This isn't an isolated example, we've been getting reports every week since the invasion started issuing similar dire warnings that widespread famine and death is just around the corner in Gaza... and then another couple weeks go by without it happening.

Meanwhile it's always accompanied by condemnations of Israel and allegations of "using starvation as a weapon of war", like this one from the Oxfam report:

Oxfam’s report today shows how Israel is causing these horrifying figures, by deliberately blocking food and aid from going into Gaza. It has been using starvation as a weapon of war for over five months now. The humanitarian situation in Gaza has actually worsened since the International Court of Justice (ICJ) specifically ordered Israel to enable more aid.  Israel’s deliberate manufacturing of suffering is systemic and of such scale and intensity that it creates a real risk of a genocide in Gaza.

I specifically want to highlight the part about Israel deliberately sending less aid after the ICJ "ordered" (lol) Israel to enable more aid.

Let's look at the actual facts -- the UNRWA's own data.  Here we go again.

https://app.powerbi.com/view?r=eyJrIjoiZTVkYmEwNmMtZWYxNy00ODhlLWI2ZjctNjIzMzQ5OGQxNzY5IiwidCI6IjI2MmY2YTQxLTIwZTktNDE0MC04ZDNlLWZkZjVlZWNiNDE1NyIsImMiOjl9&pageName=ReportSection3306863add46319dc574

back in December, the Kerem Shalom border crossing was closed and all aid went through Rafah.  So Gazans were getting about 100 trucks per day.  Starting in January the Kerem Shalom crossing opened and aid has increased to 150-200 trucks per day.  This is the UNRWA's own data, saying that aid has nearly doubled since December.  

Famine and starvation are not the same as death. Not babies obviously, but a severely malnutritioned adult can survive for 2-3 months with water but no food.

Think of concentration camp survivors.

There is some aid getting in and their is subsistence food growing wild in some parts of Gaza.

GAZA, March 25 (Reuters) - As the U.N. Security Council demands an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and concerns grow that famine may take hold, the territory's hungry civilians are foraging for a wild green plant called Khobiza for lack of anything else to eat.

The numbers of deaths will ramp up very quickly if this situation persists, which is a very ghoulish thing to argue about.

[Electric Circus]

This article from The Economist contains the following claims.

1. "The UN says Israel routinely denies approval for aid convoys. Earlier this month it bombed a food-distribution centre. Israeli forces occupy most of the farmland."

2. "Increasingly there are areas [in Gaza] where local crime families have stolen the little food brought in and are selling it for profit."

3. "Data the IPC has gathered indicate that in February 29% of children under the age of two in northern Gaza were suffering from acute malnutrition. Some 66% of families there went without any food for 24 hours at least ten times last month."

4. "[In Gaza city] only a small handful of supply convoys have been allowed in."

5. "Israel claims its war is to destroy Hamas', not the civilian population, and has denied that it is intentionally starving Gaza. But some senior Israeli politicians have called for exactly that and security officials have admitted that withholding supplies is 'a lever of pressure on Hamas to release Israeli hostages'."

Based on a glance at a few other articles in mainstream publications, this seems typical.

You can choose not to believe the IPC numbers, but either way, the following are well-supported by multiple sources, different forms of evidence, and common sense: (A) there are significant barriers to last-mile distribution, (B) much of the aid is not reaching its intended recipients, (C) some areas of Gaza are in much worse shape than others and (D) Israeli politicians and officials are constantly saying things that indicate that they don't care very much about Gaza's civilians.

[GeneralMacArthur]

Famine and starvation are not the same as death. Not babies obviously, but a severely malnutritioned adult can survive for 2-3 months with water but no food.

Think of concentration camp survivors.

There is some aid getting in and their is subsistence food growing wild in some parts of Gaza.

The numbers of deaths will ramp up very quickly if this situation persists, which is a very ghoulish thing to argue about.

This is why pro-Israel people keep talking about how fine the Gazans look though.  I've seen videos that feature plenty of overweight Gazans.  I'm certainly not a fan of the kinds of rude comments I've seen pro-Israel people making about the weight of Palestinian women, but the point stands that they certainly don't look like the concentration camp survivors who actually experienced starvation.

I mean this is what I was saying when I talked about the doctor before.  This guy doesn't look like a concentration camp victim.  He looks to be in good health and even has the time and resources to get a nice shave and high fade.  I mean more power to him, he's a good looking dude and he's doing God's work in that hospital.  But they didn't have American Crew Men's Hair Fiber in Auschwitz.  It undercuts the comparison.  Which in turn undercuts the entire argument about intentional mass famine, which would be a genocide.

This article from The Economist contains the following claims.

1. "The UN says Israel routinely denies approval for aid convoys. Earlier this month it bombed a food-distribution centre. Israeli forces occupy most of the farmland."

4. "[In Gaza city] only a small handful of supply convoys have been allowed in."

The U.N. also says that 200 trucks per day are getting through, the majority of which are in Northern Gaza, which as my original post demonstrates, is sufficient to adequately feed every single Gazan.

2. "Increasingly there are areas [in Gaza] where local crime families have stolen the little food brought in and are selling it for profit."

what would you like Israel to do about this, start shooting gangsters who disguise themselves as Palestinian civilians and steal the aid from food trucks?  We all know what the headlines would be.

This is one area I think we do both agree that Israel should be doing better.  Israel should crack down harder on criminal gangs in Northern Gaza who are stealing food, many of which I would guess are allied with Hamas.  In fact, I think if Israel finds which houses are being used as headquarters for those gangs, or finds underground shelters where they're storing weapons, they should hit them with airstrikes!  But we both know the international community's tolerance for further destruction and bloodshed in Gaza City.  Instead, Israel will be expected to combat criminal gang activity without engaging in combat.  And every single gangster they shoot will be posthumously rebranded as a civilian.

3. "Data the IPC has gathered indicate that in February 29% of children under the age of two in northern Gaza were suffering from acute malnutrition. Some 66% of families there went without any food for 24 hours at least ten times last month."

I would like to see the data and methodology for this because there is no reason 66% of families should be going without food for 24 hours when there is copious food available.

5. "Israel claims its war is to destroy Hamas', not the civilian population, and has denied that it is intentionally starving Gaza. But some senior Israeli politicians have called for exactly that and security officials have admitted that withholding supplies is 'a lever of pressure on Hamas to release Israeli hostages'."

this thread is about the reality of what's actually happening in Gaza, not the polemic of some wingnut Israeli politicians.

[lfromnj]

I mean we do know according to Gazan propaganda that someone is taking all the aid packages and selling them around. I don't know who it could be other than other Gazans.

That's part of the problem, certainly, but it's made much worse by the massive logistical difficulties transporting and distributing aid to millions of people in a war zone. Even without Hamas hoarding supplies and some people selling food for a profit, it would still be a monumental challenge.

Idk if its only Hamas stealing aid to sell. The resources gained from that would be relatively minimal. They might be hoarding to feed their fighters I guess. It is probably just local gangs.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

Famine and starvation are not the same as death. Not babies obviously, but a severely malnutritioned adult can survive for 2-3 months with water but no food.

Think of concentration camp survivors.

There is some aid getting in and their is subsistence food growing wild in some parts of Gaza.

The numbers of deaths will ramp up very quickly if this situation persists, which is a very ghoulish thing to argue about.

This is why pro-Israel people keep talking about how fine the Gazans look though.  I've seen videos that feature plenty of overweight Gazans.  I'm certainly not a fan of the kinds of rude comments I've seen pro-Israel people making about the weight of Palestinian women, but the point stands that they certainly don't look like the concentration camp survivors who actually experienced starvation.

I mean this is what I was saying when I talked about the doctor before.  This guy doesn't look like a concentration camp victim.  He looks to be in good health and even has the time and resources to get a nice shave and high fade.  I mean more power to him, he's a good looking dude and he's doing God's work in that hospital.  But they didn't have American Crew Men's Hair Fiber in Auschwitz.  It undercuts the comparison.  Which in turn undercuts the entire argument about intentional mass famine, which would be a genocide.

This article from The Economist contains the following claims.

1. "The UN says Israel routinely denies approval for aid convoys. Earlier this month it bombed a food-distribution centre. Israeli forces occupy most of the farmland."

4. "[In Gaza city] only a small handful of supply convoys have been allowed in."

The U.N. also says that 200 trucks per day are getting through, the majority of which are in Northern Gaza, which as my original post demonstrates, is sufficient to adequately feed every single Gazan.

2. "Increasingly there are areas [in Gaza] where local crime families have stolen the little food brought in and are selling it for profit."

what would you like Israel to do about this, start shooting gangsters who disguise themselves as Palestinian civilians and steal the aid from food trucks?  We all know what the headlines would be.

This is one area I think we do both agree that Israel should be doing better.  Israel should crack down harder on criminal gangs in Northern Gaza who are stealing food, many of which I would guess are allied with Hamas.  In fact, I think if Israel finds which houses are being used as headquarters for those gangs, or finds underground shelters where they're storing weapons, they should hit them with airstrikes!  But we both know the international community's tolerance for further destruction and bloodshed in Gaza City.  Instead, Israel will be expected to combat criminal gang activity without engaging in combat.  And every single gangster they shoot will be posthumously rebranded as a civilian.

3. "Data the IPC has gathered indicate that in February 29% of children under the age of two in northern Gaza were suffering from acute malnutrition. Some 66% of families there went without any food for 24 hours at least ten times last month."

I would like to see the data and methodology for this because there is no reason 66% of families should be going without food for 24 hours when there is copious food available.

5. "Israel claims its war is to destroy Hamas', not the civilian population, and has denied that it is intentionally starving Gaza. But some senior Israeli politicians have called for exactly that and security officials have admitted that withholding supplies is 'a lever of pressure on Hamas to release Israeli hostages'."

this thread is about the reality of what's actually happening in Gaza, not the polemic of some wingnut Israeli politicians.

I have no idea what videos you are referring to but there is a period during starvation that can cause bloating and that may be what is occurring.

Why does malnutrition cause stomach bloating? Kwashiorkor is a form of acute malnutrition that occurs due to protein deficiency. It can cause swelling, loss of appetite, lack of muscle and fat tissues, and more. Kwashiorkor is a serious condition that can happen when a person does not consume enough protein.

https://borgenproject.org/malnourished-people-bloated-stomachs/

[GeneralMacArthur]

I have no idea what videos you are referring to but there is a period during starvation that can cause bloating and that may be what is occurring.

Why does malnutrition cause stomach bloating? Kwashiorkor is a form of acute malnutrition that occurs due to protein deficiency. It can cause swelling, loss of appetite, lack of muscle and fat tissues, and more. Kwashiorkor is a serious condition that can happen when a person does not consume enough protein.

https://borgenproject.org/malnourished-people-bloated-stomachs/

That's not what I'm talking about, I'm talking about social media posts I've seen where pro-Israel people freeze-frame videos of Gazans and highlight obviously overweight women and mock them for being fat during a period of alleged famine -- you are on the internet so I'm sure you can imagine the comments written.

Like I think that's a pretty nasty, wretched thing to do.

But I also think it's wretched to act like the conditions in Gaza are equitable to Auschwitz or Dachau or any of the other concentration camps that the grandparents of the Israelis endured.  So I do get the point being made.

On the one hand you have people claiming the conditions in Gaza are similar to Auschwitz, where Jews were kept on 400 calorie/day rations and reduced to skeletons with bloated bellies, gaunt faces, loose skin and bones.  On the other hand you have videos of reality on the ground where people look absolutely nothing like that and in fact are perfectly healthy.  There's a clear contradiction between the two.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

I have no idea what videos you are referring to but there is a period during starvation that can cause bloating and that may be what is occurring.

Why does malnutrition cause stomach bloating? Kwashiorkor is a form of acute malnutrition that occurs due to protein deficiency. It can cause swelling, loss of appetite, lack of muscle and fat tissues, and more. Kwashiorkor is a serious condition that can happen when a person does not consume enough protein.

https://borgenproject.org/malnourished-people-bloated-stomachs/

That's not what I'm talking about, I'm talking about social media posts I've seen where pro-Israel people freeze-frame videos of Gazans and highlight obviously overweight women and mock them for being fat during a period of alleged famine -- you are on the internet so I'm sure you can imagine the comments written.

Like I think that's a pretty nasty, wretched thing to do.

But I also think it's wretched to act like the conditions in Gaza are equitable to Auschwitz or Dachau or any of the other concentration camps that the grandparents of the Israelis endured.  So I do get the point being made.

On the one hand you have people claiming the conditions in Gaza are similar to Auschwitz, where Jews were kept on 400 calorie/day rations and reduced to skeletons with bloated bellies, gaunt faces, loose skin and bones.  On the other hand you have videos of reality on the ground where people look absolutely nothing like that and in fact are perfectly healthy.  There's a clear contradiction between the two.

I would have no way to prove the veracity of these videos.

[GeneralMacArthur]

I would have no way to prove the veracity of these videos.

One thing I always find interesting during global conflicts is to go on SnapChat and look at the Snap Map hotspot to see what people are posting from some particular area of the world.  It's been annoying during this war because there are so many snaps in English that are either propaganda against a blank background, or sad face girl selfies with CashApp/Telegram requests (I'm starving can you please send me money CashApp in profile).  You have to flip through anything with English text to get to the snaps in Arabic that are actually for the local audience.

Right now go do this and come back and let me know whether the Gazans look like starving concentration camp survivors or just perfectly normal people.  I specifically didn't look before posting this because hey maybe I'm wrong and one of the first videos will be a bunch of starving people.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

I would have no way to prove the veracity of these videos.

One thing I always find interesting during global conflicts is to go on SnapChat and look at the Snap Map hotspot to see what people are posting from some particular area of the world.  It's been annoying during this war because there are so many snaps in English that are either propaganda against a blank background, or sad face girl selfies with CashApp/Telegram requests (I'm starving can you please send me money CashApp in profile).  You have to flip through anything with English text to get to the snaps in Arabic that are actually for the local audience.

Right now go do this and come back and let me know whether the Gazans look like starving concentration camp survivors or just perfectly normal people.  I specifically didn't look before posting this because hey maybe I'm wrong and one of the first videos will be a bunch of starving people.

I'm sure other people can do it, but I don't have snapchat (or Tik Tok or Whatsapp or a smart phone) and I'm not really interested in these things.