Gaza - The African Mirror

Mar

2024

By MOHAMMAD SALEM and GABRIELLE TÉTRAULT-FARBER

In Gaza, starving children fill hospital wards as famine looms

SIX-YEAR-OLD Fadi al-Zant is acutely malnourished, his ribs protruding under leathery skin, his eyes sunken as he lays in bed at the Kamal Adwan hospital in northern Gaza, where famine is bearing down. Fadi's spindly legs can no longer support him enough to walk. Photographs of Fadi from before the war show a smiling, healthy-looking child, standing in blue denims next to his taller twin with his hair brushed. A short video clip shows him dancing at a wedding with a little girl. Advertisement · Scroll to continue Fadi al-Zant in family photos. Fadi suffers from cystic fibrosis. Before the…

Mar

2024

By NIDAL AL-MUGHRABI, DAN WILLIAMS and AIDAN LEWIS

Gaza’s catastrophic food shortage means mass death is imminent, monitor says

WORLD

EXTREME food shortages in parts of the Gaza Strip have already exceeded famine levels, and mass death is now imminent without an immediate ceasefire and surge of food to areas cut off by fighting, the global hunger monitor said. The Integrated Food-Security Phase Classification (IPC), whose assessments are relied on by U.N. agencies, said 70% of people in parts of northern Gaza were suffering the most severe level of food shortage, more than triple the 20% threshold to be considered famine. The IPC said it did not have enough data on death rates, but estimated residents would be dying at famine…

Mar

2024

By RILEY SPARKS, HAJAR HARB and OMAR NABIL ABDEL HAMID

Gaza in-depth: Why Israel wants to end UNRWA and what its closure would mean

SPECIAL FEATURES: ANALYSIS

FACING allegations of violations of humanitarian neutrality, a funding freeze by major donors, and calls by Israeli officials for it to be dismantled, UNRWA, the UN’s agency for Palestine refugees is at a breaking point, according to its director-general Philippe Lazzarini. The crisis is threatening to collapse the largest aid agency in the Gaza Strip even as children have begun to die of malnutrition and dehydration due to Israel’s five-month bombardment and siege of the enclave. The immediate cause of UNRWA’s troubles stems from Israeli allegations in January that 12 of its around 13,000 staff members in Gaza were involved…

Mar

2024

By The African Mirror

Morocco secures land route to deliver aid to Gaza

NEWS

A shipment of humanitarian aid from Morocco for Palestinians in Gaza began entering the besieged enclave via a land route, the first time the Kerem Shalom border crossing from Israel has been used for aid in five months of warfare, a Moroccan diplomatic source said. The 40 tonnes of aid was being delivered by truck into northern Gaza along a route that the Rabat government has been able to secure as it had established diplomatic relations with Israel, the source said. Morocco resumed diplomatic ties with Israel in 2020. "By securing a land route to deliver aid from within Israel,…

Mar

2024

By The African Mirror

South Africa asks World Court for more measures against Israel

NEWS

SOUTH Africa has asked the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to order additional emergency measures against Israel, which it says is breaching the measures already in place, the U.N.'s top court said. In its application, South Africa warned that Palestinians in Gaza were facing starvation and asked the court to order that all parties cease hostilities and release all hostages and detainees. In a statement issued Wednesday the South African presidency warned that the people of Gaza cannot wait. "The threat of all-out famine has now materialised. The court needs to act now to stop the imminent tragedy by immediately and effectively…

Mar

2024

By JEFF MASON

Kamala Harris calls out Israel over ‘catastrophe’ in Gaza

WORLD

U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris bluntly called out Israel for not doing enough to ease a "humanitarian catastrophe" in Gaza as the Biden administration faces increasing pressure to rein in its close ally while it wages war with Hamas militants. Harris, speaking in front of the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, where state troopers beat U.S. civil rights marchers nearly six decades ago, called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and urged Hamas to accept a deal to release hostages in return for a 6-week cessation of hostilities. But she directed the bulk of her comments at Israel in…

Mar

2024

By The African Mirror

Iran’s president discusses Gaza with Algerian counterpart, Algeria’s presidency says

NEWS

Iran's President Ebrahim Raisi discussed bilateral relations, energy cooperation, trade and Gaza with Algeria's leader Abdelmadjid Tebboune in a one-day state visit, according to Algeria's presidency. Algeria, a non-permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, backs the Palestinian cause and has called several times for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.

Mar

2024

By The African Mirror

South Africa condemns Israel over deaths of Palestinians awaiting aid

NEWS

SOUTH Africa said that the killing of Palestinians awaiting aid in Gaza breached the World Court's provisional orders in a legal case in which Pretoria has accused Israel of committing genocide in the coastal enclave. Gaza health authorities said on Thursday Israeli forces had killed over 100 Palestinians trying to reach a relief convoy. Israel blamed most of the deaths on crowds that swarmed around aid trucks, saying most victims were trampled or run over though an Israeli official said Israeli troops had "in a limited response" later fired on crowds they felt posed a threat. "South Africa condemns the massacre of 112…

Feb

2024

By SAMIA NAKHOUL, JONATHAN SAUL and HUMEYRA PAMUK

Rafah attack: How Israel plans to hit Hamas and scale back war

WORLD

ISRAEL expects to continue full-scale military operations in Gaza for another six to eight weeks as it prepares to mount a ground invasion of the enclave's southernmost city of Rafah, four officials familiar with the strategy said. Military chiefs believe they can significantly damage Hamas' remaining capabilities in that time, paving the way for a shift to a lower-intensity phase of targeted airstrikes and special forces operations, according to the two Israeli and two regional officials who asked to remain anonymous to speak freely. There is little chance that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government will heed international criticism to call…

Feb

2024

By NIDAL AL-MUGHRABI

Israel bombards Gaza, with biggest functioning hospital under siege

WORLD

GAZA'S largest functioning hospital was under siege in Israel's war with Islamist group Hamas, leaving patients and doctors helpless in the chaos, as warplanes struck Rafah, the last refuge for Palestinians in the enclave, officials said. Israeli forces said on Thursday they had raided the medical complex as footage showed shouting and gunfire in dark corridors in an incursion that raised fresh alarm over the fate of hundreds of patients and medical workers and the many displaced Palestinians who had sought shelter there from the fighting. Israel's military called the raid on Nasser Hospital "precise and limited" and said it was based on information…