A global hunger-monitoring group declared last week that Gaza’s largest city and its surrounding area were suffering from an “entirely man-made” famine, mostly caused by Israel’s deliberate starvation strategy and continued siege of the territory. This news won’t surprise anyone who has paid even scant attention to the images and videos of emaciated children and desperate parents that have been coming out of Gaza for months.
But the first confirmation of famine by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), which includes the World Food Programme, the World Health Organization and other aid agencies, is an important institutional marker. Years from now, it will serve as a reminder of how Israel used starvation as a weapon of war while western powers did nothing. And it will be a source of shame for all those who will inevitably claim that they didn’t realize the extent of Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza, despite dozens of Palestinian journalists being killed for conveying that reality to the world.
