al jazeera

By Lyndal Rowlands and Alastair Mccready

    “What we are witnessing in Gaza right now is the mass killing of children in slow motion,” says Alexandra Saieh, head of humanitarian policy and advocacy at Save the Children International.
   The Gaza Health Ministry says six children died in north Gaza from dehydration and malnutrition at Kamal Adwan and al-Shifa hospitals, while others are in critical condition.
   Doctors Without Borders warns that Gaza’s whole healthcare system is collapsing: “Healthcare has been attacked, it’s collapsing.”
   It is “a matter of life and death” that more aid crossings opened to Gaza, says Samantha Power, the head of USAID.
   At least 29,954 people have been killed and 70,325 wounded in Israeli attacks on Gaza since October 7. The revised death toll in Israel from the October 7 attacks stands at 1,139.

    Humanitarian relief airdrops help Israel’s ‘blockade strategy’, says Refugees International chief

    Jeremy Konyndyk, the president of Refugees International, has said that the amount of aid delivered in airdrops is so “negligible” that it helps “perpetuate the overall blockade strategy”.

    “Facilitating airdrops – and driving media coverage around them – gives the public appearance that Israel is cooperating with humanitarian efforts,” said Konyndyk, who is also a former USAID official.

    “The fact that they need be considered is a major policy failure,” he said, in a post on social media.

    The Israeli army has said “160 packages of food and medical equipment were airdropped into southern Gaza” as part of a joint mission with the US, the UAE, Jordan, Egypt and France.

    According to UNRWA, the number of aid trucks entering the Gaza Strip has dropped by half in February compared to January.

    Israeli PM discusses ‘current challenges’ with UN’s Gaza aid coordinator Sigrid Kaag

    The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he met with Sigrid Kaag, the United Nations’ senior coordinator for humanitarian aid and reconstruction in Gaza.

    Netanyahu and Kaag “discussed some of the current challenges in the region and possible policies to confront them”, the prime minister’s office said, as the death toll in Gaza nears 30,000 and as aid agencies warn of the “slow motion” mass killing of children due to food shortages and disease in the Palestinian territory.

    Netanyahu’s office did not provide further details.

    UN officials and nongovernmental organisations have strongly criticised Israeli authorities for severely restricting aid entering Gaza and preventing almost all relief supplies from reaching northern Gaza, which they warn is on the brink of a man-made famine due to Israel’s policies.

    Kaag was appointed in December by UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to oversee humanitarian aid delivery to the Gaza Strip.