By Emma Farge and Nidal al-Mughrabi
GENEVA/CAIRO (Reuters) – The World Food Programme said on Friday it had run out of food stocks in Gaza due to the sustained closure of crossings into the enclave, while Gaza authorities said Israeli airstrikes had killed at least 78 people in the past 24 hours.
“The WFP has depleted all its food stocks for families in Gaza,” a WFP statement said, adding the U.N. agency on Friday delivered its last remaining food stocks to hot meals kitchens in Gaza.
“These kitchens are expected to fully run out of food in the coming days,” it added.
The agency said no humanitarian or commercial supplies had entered Gaza for more than seven weeks as all main border crossing points remained closed, resulting in the longest closure the Gaza Strip had ever faced.
Israel has previously denied that Gaza is facing a hunger crisis. The military accuses the Hamas militants who have run Gaza of exploiting aid – which Hamas denies – and says it must keep all supplies out to prevent the fighters from getting it.
Since March 2, Israel completely cut off all supplies to the 2.3 million residents of the Gaza Strip, and food stockpiled during a ceasefire at the start of the year has all but run out.
WFP warned that if the aid blockage was not lifted it might be forced to end its critical assistance.
On March 31, all 25 WFP-supported bakeries closed after wheat flour and cooking fuel ran out, while parcels giving families two weeks of food rations were depleted.
The Hamas-run Gaza government media office on Friday said that famine is no longer a looming threat and is becoming a reality. “Thousands of Palestinian families are now facing starvation after becoming unable to provide even a single meal for their children,” it said in a statement.
Fifty-two people have died due to hunger and malnutrition, including 50 children, while more than one million children are experiencing hunger daily, it added.
The Israeli ministry of foreign affairs said 25,000 aid trucks had entered Gaza in the 42 days of the ceasefire – before it shut the border at the start of March – and that Hamas had used the aid to rebuild its war machine.
Food prices have risen 1,400 percent compared to during the ceasefire, WFP said, adding that more than 116,000 metric tons of food assistance which could feed one million people for up to four months is currently stuck at the border crossing.
STRIKES IN GAZA
On Friday, the Gaza health ministry said Israeli airstrikes killed at least 78 people in different areas of the enclave in the past 24 hours.
Residents said Israeli forces operating in Shejaia and Rafah in northern and southern Gaza blew up clusters of homes overnight.
Citing attacks initiated from those areas, the Israeli military ordered residents of Beit Hanoun and the Beit Lahiya towns to leave their homes in a post published on X by an army spokesperson late on Thursday.
The new orders caused a new wave of displacement as many families began leaving their homes in the early hours on Friday, according to witnesses.
Sources familiar with the mediation said a Hamas delegation was expected to visit Cairo on Friday to meet Egyptian officials and discuss ways to salvage stalled ceasefire talks.
Since a January ceasefire collapsed on March 18, Israeli attacks have killed more than 1,900 Palestinians, many of them civilians, according to health authorities in Gaza, and hundreds of thousands have been displaced as Israel seized what it calls a buffer zone.
An attack on Israel by Hamas in October 2023 killed 1,200 people, and 251 hostages were taken to Gaza. Since then, more than 51,300 Palestinians have been killed in the Israeli offensive in Gaza, according to health officials.
(Reporting by Emma Farge, Additional reporting by Olivia Le Poidevin in Geneva, Editing by Rachel More, William Maclean)
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