21 children die of hunger in Gaza within 72 hours
- Last updated: July 22, 2025 | 21:53
The head of Gaza's largest hospital on Tuesday said 21 children have died due to malnutrition and starvation in the Palestinian territory in the past three days, amid a devastating assault by Israeli forces.
Gaza's population of more than two million people is facing severe shortages of food and other essentials, with residents frequently killed as they try to collect humanitarian aid at a handful of distribution points.
Dr. Mohammed Abu Salmiya, Director of Al-Shifa Medical Complex in Gaza, said on Tuesday that "21 children have died due to malnutrition and famine" across various areas of the Gaza Strip, as the humanitarian catastrophe reaches unprecedented levels of hunger amid expanding Israeli military operations.
Abu Salmiya expressed grave concern, stating: “We are heading toward frightening numbers of deaths due to the starvation affecting Gaza’s residents. 900,000 children in Gaza are suffering from hunger, and 70,000 of them have entered the stage of malnutrition.”
Meanwhile, Gaza's Civil Defense announced on Tuesday morning that 15 Palestinians were killed in Israeli airstrikes, just hours after the World Health Organization condemned the bombing of its headquarters and main warehouse in Deir al-Balah.
The Civil Defense continues to record daily casualties from Israeli attacks, whether in remaining homes, tents housing displaced families, or while people wait in line for aid.
Twenty-five Western countries have called for an immediate end to the devastating war, now ongoing for 21 months, saying the suffering of civilians facing famine has reached “unprecedented levels.”
On Tuesday, European Union Foreign Affairs Chief Kaja Kallas stated that the Israeli military “must stop killing” civilians at aid distribution points.
In a post on X, Kallas wrote: “Killing civilians seeking aid in Gaza is indefensible. I spoke again with (Israeli Foreign Minister) Gideon Sa’ar to reiterate our understanding about aid flow, and I stressed that the Israeli military must stop killing people at distribution points.”
On Tuesday, the United Nations reported that more than 1,000 people had been killed by Israeli forces while trying to access aid.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights said: “As of July 21, we have recorded 1,054 people killed in Gaza while attempting to obtain food,” confirming they were killed by the Israeli military.
Gaza Civil Defense spokesperson Mahmoud Basal said: “Thirteen victims and more than 50 injuries, including children and women, were received at Al-Shifa Hospital following the massacre committed by the occupation in an airstrike targeting displaced persons' tents” in Al-Shati camp west of Gaza City.
In Deir al-Balah, in central Gaza, Basal said that “two more victims” were transferred.
Footage showed plumes of smoke rising from the area as the sound of a surveillance drone buzzed overhead. Raed Bakr, who lives in a tent in Al-Shati camp with his three children, said he woke to a massive explosion and felt he was living in a “nightmare: fire, dust, smoke, flying body parts, and dirt in the air, with children screaming — my tent was blown away.”
He added: “Neighbors carried the injured on foot because there are no cars or donkey carts. We didn’t sleep… It was a terrifying night.”
Muhannad Thabet, 33, said: “It was a night of horror… shelling and explosions. They’ve destroyed us! Children and women were martyred and wounded while they were sleeping.” He added that he carried a six-year-old injured child from one of the targeted tents to Al-Shifa Hospital with the child’s grandmother.
“I carried him in my arms and rushed with his grandmother on foot to the hospital. The hospital was overcrowded with wounded… Isn’t hunger enough?”
In a distress call, Dr. Fadel Naim, Director of Al-Ahli Arab Hospital (Baptist Hospital) in Gaza, said that doctors and all medical, technical, and administrative staff are “starving, deprived of food, sleep, and rest.”
He highlighted the dire humanitarian conditions faced by healthcare workers who “continue to work to save the lives of the wounded and sick while their own bodies are collapsing, and we can do nothing about it.”
In Jerusalem, Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem Pierbattista Pizzaballa stated Tuesday, after returning from Gaza, that the humanitarian situation in the Strip — where residents face daily bombardments and severe food shortages — is “morally unacceptable.”
Pizzaballa, who visited Gaza on Friday after an Israeli strike hit the Church of the Holy Family in Gaza City last week, killing three people, said: “We saw men standing under the sun for hours, hoping for a simple meal… This is morally unacceptable and unjustifiable.”
Agencies