Over 30,000 killed in Gaza as UN warns of ‘imminent’ famine

Photo: Gaza’s health ministry said that, in addition to 30,035 deaths, more than 70,000 people have been injured since October 7. Belal Khaled/Anadolu/Getty Images

Displaced Palestinians wait to receive free food at a tent camp amid food shortages in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, on February 27, 2024. © Ibraheem Abu Mustafa, Reuters

The death toll in the besieged Gaza Strip surpassed 30,000 on Thursday, according to figures from the Hamas-run health ministry, as mediators worked to secure a truce that would allow more aid into the enclave. The World Food Program warned a day earlier that famine is “imminent” in northern Gaza. 

Summary:

• Aid convoys carrying food reached northern Gaza this week, Israeli officials said, the first major delivery in a month.
• Hamas urged Palestinians to march to Jerusalem‘s flashpoint Al-Aqsa Mosque at the start of Ramadan in March, raising the stakes amid ongoing truce talks. US President Joe Biden said Israel had agreed to halt its offensive for the Muslim holy month while Qatar’s foreign ministry said on Tuesday that mediators were “hopeful, not necessarily optimistic” of having a truce this week.
• At least 576,000 people in the Gaza Strip – a quarter of the population – are one step away from famine, a senior UN aid official told the Security Council, warning that widespread famine was “almost inevitable” without action.
• At least 30,035  people have been killed and 70,325 wounded in Israeli strikes, according to the Hamas-run health ministry. Around 1,140 people were killed in the Hamas-led October 7 attacks and 250 people were taken hostage, according to Israeli figures, with 132 still missing.
• Israel’s War Cabinet decided to revoke the authority of National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir to limit the entry to the Temple Mount during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan to prevent the escalation of tensions there, Israel’s media reported Wednesday evening. Gvir reacted with outrage.
• Israel is facing mounting pressure globally to halt the conflict, but its campaign in Gaza has retained the support of the United States, its key ally and largest supplier of military aid. Last week, the US vetoed for the third time the UN Security Council’s calls for an immediate halt in the conflict.
• UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk said Thursday “There appears to be no bounds, no words, to capture the horrors that are unfolding before our eyes in Gaza.”What is happening in Gaza is “carnage” Turk said, speaking at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. “It is time – well past time – for peace, investigation, and accountability,” Turk said.

France24/ CNN