UN accuses Israel of denying humanitarian access to the Gaza Strip while warning of food crisis

A senior United Nations (UN) official accused Israel on Sunday (5) of continuing to deny the organization humanitarian access to the Gaza Strip, where the director of the UN food program warned of a “total famine” in northern Gaza. Palestinian territory, which is home to 2.3 million people, according to information from CNN.

The executive director of the World Food Programme, Cindy McCain, in an interview with NBC News broadcast this Sunday, described the situation as “there is hunger, total hunger, in the north, and it is moving towards the south”, although she did not formally declare a situation of hunger.

Tensions rose further when Israel’s military announced on Monday that it had begun encouraging residents of the southern Gaza city of Rafah to evacuate the area as part of a “limited scope” operation. However, they did not immediately confirm media reports that this was part of preparations for a ground attack.

The prospect of an operation with a potential high number of casualties worries Western powers and neighboring Egypt, especially with more than a million displaced Palestinians already sheltering in the region.