A prominent U.S.-based think tank has accused Israel of weaponising starvation in Gaza as part of a broader campaign of forced displacement and collective punishment. In a damning new report, the Arab Center Washington DC asserts that hunger is no longer a byproduct of war, but a deliberate tactic aimed at breaking Palestinian resistance and redrawing the map through mass expulsion.

For over eight months, Gaza has endured an Israeli-imposed blockade that chokes the flow of food, fuel, and humanitarian aid. According to the UN, not a single day since the war began has met the minimum threshold of necessary relief. Children are dying of hunger. Thousands more suffer without medical care, clean water, or shelter, their lives quietly slipping away as the world watches.

The report also condemns U.S.-led efforts to bypass traditional aid channels. From failed airdrops that caused civilian deaths to a floating pier that provided barely a day’s worth of food, these so-called solutions have done little but distract from the root cause: Israel’s deliberate denial of access. The newly formed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, run by private military contractors and operating outside the UN, has already been linked to mass casualties at aid points targeted by Israeli gunfire.

Survivors describe these scenes as death traps, aid queues turned into ambushes. More than 300 people have been killed while simply trying to reach food. And with distribution limited to a handful of zones, many are forced to travel through active war zones to survive. It’s not just negligence, it’s architecture, the report argues: the architecture of displacement.

By concentrating aid in certain areas and starving others, Israel is effectively herding Palestinians into narrow, controllable corridors, a strategy analysts describe as engineered depopulation. The report cites Israeli officials openly advocating for the resettlement of Gaza’s population, with one minister claiming total destruction would “encourage migration.”

Despite mounting evidence and global outrage, meaningful action remains absent. Aid convoys are blocked. Activists are arrested. And governments continue to issue statements while enabling the blockade through silence, arms sales, and political cover.

“This is not a humanitarian crisis,” the report concludes. “It is a crime, organised, prolonged, and made possible by those who chose to look away.”