Host: Ezgi Toper
Guests: Nizar Sadawi

Producer: Ezgi Toper
Craft Editor: Nasrullah Yilmaz
Supervising Editor: Burak Bayram
Production Team: Afzal Ahmed, Mucteba Samil Olmez, Khaled Selim
Executive Producer: Nasra Omar Bwana

Transcript

NIZAR: This is a textbook case of man-made famine. Israel has enforced a complete siege on Gaza since March. Barely any food, fuel, or humanitarian aid has been allowed in. They're not just letting people starve; they've targeted the systems that could prevent this from happening. 

EZGI: Palestinians in Gaza have been killed, wounded, displaced, and now they are being forcibly starved. This is a man-made famine. There’s no drought or any natural disaster. Israel has engineered this famine that has become so severe that it’s now irreversible.

The UN agency UNRWA says Gaza is currently in Stage 5 hunger: this is the deadliest level according to global food security standards. It marks the total collapse of food systems, where death becomes more common than finding food.

Since October 2023, the Palestinian Health Ministry says over a hundred people have died from malnutrition. Approximately 80% of them were children. Among them was a six-week-old infant, according to doctors in northern Gaza. The infant’s mother couldn’t breastfeed him because she wasn’t eating, and the family couldn’t find baby formula anywhere.

For this episode, I spoke to Nizar Sadawi, Palestinian journalist and TRT World’s Middle East Correspondent. He breaks down how Israel has weaponised hunger.

One of the first things that Nizar and I spoke about was the all-too-familiar image we keep seeing out of Gaza: crowds of people holding up empty metal pots, arms outstretched for food.

NIZAR: Their expressions are indescribable, to be honest. They're obviously worn down by exhaustion and uncertainty. You can almost hear the silence in their eyes, a silence carved by war, famine, death, the collapse of every safety net that once existed. The soup kitchen they depend on has likely run out of food again. Again, aid is very scarce, and these children may not have eaten in days.

EZGI: I asked Nizar to describe what hunger in Gaza actually looks like right now. What are people facing on a day-to-day basis? 

NIZAR: At least, and I do mean at least 100 people, including dozens of children, have officially died from hunger and malnutrition. The UN and humanitarian agencies have been raising the alarm for months, and nearly 1.2 million people are now experiencing what's called emergency-level hunger. That's not just skipping meals, that's being at constant risk of death from lack of food. Hospitals in Gaza, those that are still functioning or partially functioning, have treated over 6,000 children for acute malnutrition just in June alone. The health infrastructure, what's left of it, is collapsing. The markets are empty, and food prices have become so absurd. They're simply out of reach. People aren't eating less in Gaza. They're literally going days without food.

EZGI: Palestinians are trying every possible way to get food: they are lining up for aid despite the deadly risks and facing skyrocketing prices in markets. Nizar explains the different ways Palestinians try to get food in Gaza.

NIZAR: It's like every route to food in Gaza has a trapdoor beneath it. Here's what people are doing. Well, mainly, they keep lining up for aid. This is the most common method, but also the most dangerous. Crowds form around aid trucks, often without warning, and Israeli forces have repeatedly opened fire since late May, for example. Over 1000 Palestinians have been killed just trying to get food. That's not hyperbole. That's documented by the UN. People are literally dying in line for flour, buying from markets, I mean. That is a method, but prices have actually skyrocketed. A 25 kg bag of flour used to cost maybe $10 or less before the war. Now it's around $400 sometimes, $500. For most people, that's simply unattainable. So even when food is available, it might as well be behind the glass wall.

Before the war, of course, Gaza had farms and greenhouses, but most of that has been bombed or bulldozed, trees uprooted, irrigation systems destroyed, much like every aspect of life there in Gaza. Some families tried to grow herbs or vegetables in small plots or rubble patches. But there's also the threat of unexploded bombs in open fields. Those who still have a bit of food stretch it to the last crumb. Some are sun-drying what they can. Others try to make makeshift fridges by digging into the ground, but with no electricity or fuel, of course, it's a losing battle. So in short, Palestinians are either risking their lives, spending a fortune they don't have, or surviving off scraps. But I mean, we've seen horrific scenes of children digging through garbage. Looking for food, something to eat or to drink. But these attempts often go in vain because even the trash has no food in Gaza.

EZGI: And even when food is available, cooking it is another battle. Palestinians have adapted their diets and cooking methods due to this scarcity, as Nizar explains.

NIZAR: People have stripped their meals down to the barest of basics. Forget meat, dairy, or even vegetables. Families are now surviving on plain rice or pasta or lentils when they're lucky, and again when they are lucky or if they get lucky. Some mothers mix flour with water and sugar, trying to convince toddlers it's milk, but unfortunately, even that is not easy because sugar has become so expensive that these mothers simply cannot afford to buy it.

One family even told a reporter, a friend of mine, that they'd been boiling weeds from the side of the road. As for cooking, fuel is gone, and that has been the case since the beginning of the war in 2023. No gas, no electricity, so people are burning wood, but that has become pricey as well. They burned. What was left of their furniture, even books, by the way, to cook a single pot of lentils, for example. There's no fridges, so everything spoils fast and again, there's no electricity to begin with. So every meal they can cook every once in a while when they get lucky is actually a gamble to cook that meal is a gamble, and it's not just about hunger anymore. It's about dignity. It's about kids crying themselves to sleep because they haven't eaten in two days. It's about families pretending food is on the table when there isn't any. It's about the fact that the world has been shouting, crying, yelling, praying that this genocide would stop. But most of these attempts are in vain. Palestinians in Gaza have actually lost hope. And the idea that there is enough humanity to make things change, to make life. Less worse for them.

EZGI: And while this impacts all Palestinians. There are certain groups that are more risk of starvation. They’re weak and at urgent risk of dying if they don’t get the treatment they need. According to UNRWA’s latest findings, one in every five children is malnourished in Gaza City, and cases are increasing every day. UNRWA Commissioner General Philippe Lazzarini said that most children the teams are seeing are emaciated. They are weak and are at high risk of dying if they don’t get the treatment they urgently need. 

NIZAR: Malnutrition among children has reached unprecedented levels. 650,000 children in Gaza, again, are at risk of death because of this starvation. Infants, especially those who aren't breastfed, are in critical danger. Formula is gone. Milk is gone. Clean water is a luxury. Pregnant and breastfeeding women, by the way, are also at high risk. Many are starving themselves just to feed their babies, and that is not doable. That is not possible. There are 60,000 pregnant women in Gaza right now, more than 60,000, and they're all at risk because of this, because of the genocide and the starvation that are happening. Then there's the elderly, the chronically ill, the disabled, and displaced families, which is the case for more than 90% of the population in Gaza, especially those living in tent camps or schools and shelters. They are often lost in line for any kind of aid.

That is the problem. That is one of the main problems. Those with chronic illnesses, by the way it seems that the world. Has somehow forgotten that just because there is a war doesn't mean that people don't get sick anymore. There are no medications in Gaza, no properly functioning hospitals. Many people, many people have died, the chronically ill, because of the situation there, not because they were bombed directly, but because they couldn't find medication. They couldn't receive any sort of treatment, and that continues to be the case, unfortunately.  

EZGI: From what Nizar describes, this famine is simply not a side effect of war, it is a strategy. So I asked him, is Israel weaponising hunger?

NIZAR: Yes, absolutely. This is a textbook case of man-made famine. Israel has enforced a complete siege on Gaza since March. Barely any food, fuel, or humanitarian aid has been allowed in. They bombed wheat mills, bakeries, food warehouses, even greenhouses and fishing boats, and by the way, fishermen have not been allowed to go to fishing for weeks now. They're not just letting people starve; they've targeted the systems that could prevent this from happening. Even aid convoys are risky now. By the way, more than 121 aid convoys, according to experts there have been targeted since the beginning of the war. People say trucks carrying food have moving death zones. Imagine this. Moving death zones. So yes, hunger is being used as a tool of war. The UN says that aid groups say it. The evidence is overwhelming.

EZGI: Nizar touches on something really impactful here. Aid trucks, which are supposed to bring life-saving food, have become deadly targets; instead of being safe havens or symbols of hope, they have become moving death zones. They are now too dangerous to approach. And even before this war, most people in Gaza depended on aid.

NIZAR: Palestinians have faced food insecurity for decades, but this is new. This is unprecedented. Before October 2023. Between 75 and 80% of the population there in Gaza were dependent on aid, international aid to survive, and half of the population was already, unemployed. Half the population experienced food insecurity, but what's happening now is on a completely different scale. We're not talking about poverty anymore. We're talking about a calculated large-scale starvation strategy, a complete collapse of the food system enforced through siege and violence. That is exactly what is happening there.

EZGI: He compares the famine in Gaza to other man-made famines in places like Sudan and Yemen, but says Gaza stands out because of how fast the food system collapsed and how visible it’s all been. 

NIZAR: Well, we've seen famine used as a weapon in different places throughout history. I mean, Sudan, Yemen, Syria, even back during the Second World War. But what makes Gaza different is the scale and speed. UN experts are calling this the worst man-made famine. Since the Second World War, and it's not just because people are dying, it's because we knew this would happen and we let it. That's the thing the world knew that this is going to happen. And they did nothing to stop it. They tried, maybe. People tried, but there was no success. Everything is being documented in real time, and yet the siege continues. So in that sense, Gaza has become a mirror showing us as human beings how far we've allowed cruelty to go.

EZGI: And this crisis is affecting everyone, including those trying to save lives in the war-torn UNRWA enclave. UNRWA commissioner Phillipe Lazarinni says that UNRWA front-line workers are surviving on one meal a day, if at all. And often it is just lentils. They are increasingly fainting due to hunger while at work. So when caretakers can not find enough to eat. The entire humanitarian system collapses. And perhaps the most devastating part is there is food available. In fact UNRWA’s commissioner says they have the equivalent of 6,000 loaded trucks of food and medical supplies in Jordan and Egypt. The stock is only a few kilometres away. And it is reportedly enough for the entire population of Gaza for the next 3 months. But Israel is blocking their entry.

NIZAR: World leaders are speaking up loudly. Organizations too. UNICEF, WHO, WFP all warning of catastrophic hunger. Some countries are pushing for more aid corridors, but the truth is there's been very little action. The UN hasn't officially declared famine, partly because they can't get the data and partly because of political pressure. Meanwhile, aid groups on the ground say what's coming next is a full-blown blown irreversible humanitarian collapse. Imagine this. A full-blown, irreversible humanitarian collapse. What Gaza needs now, isn't just food, it's a ceasefire, full access to humanitarian aid, and rebuilding of the food system, and it needs to happen fast because children don't have time to wait for geopolitics. Yes, there are many countries that are standing for Palestinians now, world leaders, many of them are speaking about this and pushing for it. But Palestinians in Gaza need things to change. Quickly before it's too late.

EZGI: Recently, aid groups and journalists amplified their calls for urgent action.  Over 100 aid organisations, including Doctors Without Borders (MSF) and Save the Children, released a recent joint statement saying that their "colleagues and those (they) serve are wasting away". They called for an immediate negotiated ceasefire, the opening of all land crossings and the free flow of aid through UN-led mechanisms. 

But even if food were let in today, it wouldn’t be enough. Prolonged starvation causes irreversible organ failure. Israel created the famine and then deliberately pushed it past the point of recovery. 

Thanks for tuning in. Until next time, I’m Ezgi Toper, and this was “In the Newsroom”.

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