As the Israeli blockade tightens and bombardments persist, Gaza is plunging deeper into a man-made catastrophe. Now entering its eighth week, the siege has left millions facing starvation, with basic services collapsing and humanitarian aid blocked at the borders. Aid groups and civilians alike are sounding the alarm: Gaza is starving.

According to The Guardian, the near-total cutoff of food, fuel, and medicine has pushed the region into one of the worst humanitarian disasters in recent history. Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) reports that clinics are forced to turn patients away due to a lack of medical supplies, while Oxfam warns that most children in Gaza now survive on less than one meal a day.

The blockade has compounded the destruction already caused by ongoing Israeli attacks. More than 70% of Gaza is under evacuation orders or designated as military buffer zones. Hospitals are overwhelmed, shelters overcrowded, and over 420,000 more people have been displaced. The few medical facilities that remain are barely functional, with some intentionally targeted and destroyed in airstrikes.

From Rafah to Al-Mawasi, relentless military operations are decimating civilian life. Residents like Hikmat al-Masri from northern Gaza confess that starvation now terrifies them more than bombs. “I fear for my son more than anything,” she told The Guardian, her voice echoing the desperation of countless parents forced to ration scraps in the rubble of their homes.

Children are wasting away—both physically and emotionally. Aid workers describe the trauma in their faces, the silence of hunger replacing even the cries of fear. It is not just food that’s been stolen—it is their childhood, their hope, their future.

Yet the international response remains tepid. Calls to lift the blockade and allow unimpeded aid have gone largely ignored. At the United Nations, divisions stall any concrete action, while the devastation in Gaza accelerates. Rights groups and humanitarian organisations have long warned that the destruction of vital infrastructure—hospitals, schools, water networks—is part of a deliberate policy of collective punishment.

Unless urgent action is taken, Gaza will descend into full-scale famine. The blockade must be lifted. Aid must flow. Lives must be saved—not mourned.

As Hikmat al-Masri pleaded, “We don’t need promises or empty words. We need food, medicine, and peace—before it’s too late.”

The time for statements has passed. The world must act, or live with the stain of complicity in this unfolding tragedy.