GENEVA: The United Nations has announced plans to maximise aid delivery to Gaza’s starving population following Israel’s decision to establish secure land routes for humanitarian convoys.

The World Food Programme confirmed sufficient food supplies are available to feed Gaza’s 2.1 million residents for nearly three months.

UN emergency relief coordinator Tom Fletcher stated the organisation would work to reach “as many starving people as we can” during the temporary pause. Israel’s one-week suspension of military operations aims to facilitate aid distribution amid worsening hunger.

Fletcher welcomed Israel’s move to ease restrictions, including lifting customs barriers on essential supplies from Egypt and securing convoy routes.

Initial reports indicated over 100 aid trucks were collected on Sunday, though Fletcher stressed the need for sustained efforts.

“We need faster clearances, multiple daily convoy trips, and safe routes avoiding crowded areas,“ he said.

The WFP emphasised the critical need for food aid, revealing that a third of Gaza’s population has gone days without eating, while 470,000 endure famine-like conditions.

Monthly, 62,000 tonnes of food assistance are required to sustain Gaza’s two million residents.

Israel has pledged to expedite truck clearances and ensure no armed forces interfere with convoys. The WFP hopes these measures will accelerate food distribution.

Meanwhile, UN rights chief Volker Turk condemned Israel’s failure to meet its obligations as an occupying power, describing Gaza as a “dystopian landscape of deadly attacks and total destruction.”

Turk criticised the US- and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation for chaotic aid distribution, citing over 1,000 Palestinian deaths near its sites since May. – Reuters

Israel said it paused military activity in parts of Gaza on Sunday to allow in international aid, amid growing outrage over the severe hunger faced by Palestinians in the territory.

The decision was a reversal by Israel that followed growing pressure over the dire conditions in Gaza, where nearly one in three people has not been eating “for multiple days in a row,” according to the World Food Program, an arm of the United Nations.

Many countries, including some of Israel’s traditional allies, blame Israel for the widespread hunger crisis. The Israeli government blocked almost all aid to Gaza from March through May in an effort to squeeze concessions from Hamas, and has restricted aid deliveries into the territory since then.

The Israeli military said that as part of the policy change that began on Sunday, Israeli forces would pause operations daily in at least three parts of Gaza from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. to allow aid to enter. It added that they would also designate secure routes for U.N. convoys to deliver aid between specified hours.

On Sunday morning, Israel announced it would begin a daily “humanitarian pause” in three densely populated areas of Gaza as it comes under increasing international pressure to alleviate the territory’s worsening starvation crisis.

Other measures also announced include the resumption of airdropped aid, the activation of a desalination plant and the provision of humanitarian corridors to facilitate UN aid deliveries within Gaza.

How bad is Gaza’s starvation crisis? Last week the territory slipped into a full-blown starvation crisis, with dozens dying from hunger. According to the World Food Programme (WFP), 90,000 women and children are in urgent need of treatment for malnutrition, while one in three people are going without food for days. Doctors in Gaza have described struggling to keep up with the number of patients coming in seeking treatment for malnourishment, with few tools at their disposal to provide them help. “Our malnutrition ward in the hospital is extremely overcrowded. Due to the large number of cases, some children are forced to sleep on the floor,” said Dr Ahmad al-Farra, the director of paediatrics at Nasser medical complex. The hunger crisis has affected virtually everyone in the Gaza Strip, with organisations such as the UN describing their staff as “walking corpses”.

How much aid was getting in before Sunday? After resuming fighting in mid-March, Israel blocked all aid from entering Gaza for two and a half months, in what it said was an attempt to exert pressure on Hamas to release hostages. In May, Israel started allowing a trickle of aid in, mostly through the private US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF). Israel proposed the GHF as an alternative to the UN-aid system after claiming – without providing evidence – that Hamas was systematically stealing aid from the UN. More than 1,000 people have been killed while trying to get aid, most of them near GHF food distribution sites. In total, Israel has let in 4,500 UN aid trucks into Gaza since May – an average of about 70 trucks a day. This is a far cry from prewar figures of 500-600 trucks a day, which the UN said is a requisite amount to help restore the health of Gaza’s population.

How will Israel’s announcement change the amount of aid that gets into Gaza? Israel has announced airdropped aid will resume, which humanitarian organisations have said will provide a negligible amount of supplies. It also said that humanitarian corridors would be established to facilitate the entry of UN aid trucks into Gaza, though the number of trucks that will be allowed in was not specified. NGOs say these steps may ease aid access, but with mass starvation already under way, far more is needed. In particular, humanitarian groups have called for a full ceasefire in order to get civilians the help they need. “We have to go back to the levels we had during the ceasefire, 500-600 trucks of aid every day managed by the UN, including Unrwa, that our teams would distribute in 400 distribution points,” said Juliette Touma, the Unrwa director of communications. She explained that aid agencies had previously walked Gaza back from the brink of starvation and that to do so again, an unimpeded flow of aid would be needed to “reverse the tide and trajectory of famine”. Unrwa, which Israel banned from operating in Gaza in January, has 6,000 trucks of aid loaded with food, medicine and other hygiene supplies in Jordan and Egypt. The WFP said on Sunday it had enough aid to feed the population of Gaza for three months. Israel’s latest announcement also is unclear about how long it will maintain the pauses and corridors. Humanitarians have said consistency is key to their work. It also appears that Israel is relaxing some of its restrictions on the role of the UN in distributing aid in Gaza, but to what extent is unclear. The UN has said that only it is able to distribute aid efficiently within the territory, pointing to the deadly killings around the GHF as an example of why expertise is needed.

A mass starvation is unfolding in Gaza, with a UN agency noting that one in five children is malnourished and cases are increasing every day. Amid this dire situation, Israel has announced a ‘tactical pause’ in fighting and also allowed for airdrops of aid to the hungry people. But will it be enough? read more

Children and youths gather as a C-130 Hercules military transport aircraft flies over during an aiddrop on the northern Gaza Strip on Sunday, July 27. Two Jordanian and one Emirati plane on dropped 25 tonnes of humanitarian aid over the Gaza Strip, Jordanian state television reported on July 27. AFP

“We are expected to save lives while our own are slowly being consumed. This is not just about hunger, but about the slow destruction of life, ability, and humanity.”

This remark rightly sums up the situation in Gaza where everyone and anyone is starving. In fact, the World Health Organisation (Who) has warned that malnutrition has reached “alarming levels” in Gaza with rates on a “dangerous trajectory”, while UN’s Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA) has noted that one in five children in Gaza City is malnourished and cases are increasing every day.

STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD

Amid this situation, on Sunday morning (July 27), Israel announced it would begin a daily “humanitarian pause” in three densely populated areas of Gaza as well as announced the resumption of airdropped aid.

Following the announcement, Jordanian and Emirati planes began dropping food into Gaza. But the question is — is it enough? Will it help alleviate the hunger crisis unfolding in the besieged enclave?

How bad is the situation in Gaza?

Even before the war began following the attacks on October 7, 2024, the situation in Gaza was not too good — the enclave has often been referred to as Israel’s open-air prison. But ever since the war broke out, a humanitarian crisis has been unfolding in the enclave.

As a result of the war, thousands of Gazans have been displaced; forced to live in the streets or makeshift tents. As Gaza’s infrastructure has been destroyed, access to water and power has become more difficult.

Moreover, the delivery of food aid has been interrupted as a result of the war and restrictions laid down by the Israeli military. In fact, before the conflict, some 3,000 aid and commercial trucks would enter Gaza every week. This number has drastically plummeted since then.

Palestinians crowd at a lentil soup distribution point in Gaza City in the northern Gaza Strip. AFP

As a result, starvation, extreme hunger and malnourishment have taken root in Gaza. According to the World Food Programme (WFP), 90,000 women and children are in urgent need of treatment for malnutrition, while one in three people are going without food for days. More than 100 aid and human rights groups warned last week that “mass starvation” was spreading.

STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD

On July 23, the Palestinian health ministry announced that the death toll due to hunger in the past five days had risen to 43, whereas, the Who announced that more than 50 children have died of malnutrition since March.

Doctors and nurses are struggling with the food crisis in Gaza. Doctors describe their battle to keep up with the number of patients coming in, seeking treatment. As Dr Ahmad al-Farra, the director of paediatrics at Nasser medical complex, told _The Guardia_n, “Our malnutrition ward in the hospital is extremely overcrowded. Due to the large number of cases, some children are forced to sleep on the floor.”

Dr Nick Maynard, a British surgeon who is volunteering at the Nasser Hospital in southern Gaza recounts the scenes unfolding at the facility. “The expression ‘skin and bones’ doesn’t do it justice. I saw the severity of malnutrition that I would not have thought possible in a civilized world. This is man-made starvation being used as a weapon of war and it will lead to many more deaths unless food and aid is let in immediately,” he told the New York Times.

STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD

A Palestinian woman holds her five-month-old daughter, who is malnourished, according to medics, at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip. Reuters

Doctors also note that the lack of food has resulted in many to die of other conditions, as they were too weak to fend it off. Starvation is causing more mothers to suffer miscarriages or give birth prematurely, to malnourished babies with weakened immune systems and medical abnormalities.

“The result is a rise in infections, dehydration and even immune collapse in infants,” said Dr Hani al-Faleet, a paediatric consultant at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in central Gaza. “The immediate cause of death in some of these cases is simple: The baby doesn’t get enough to eat, and neither does the mother.”

The situation is so dire that even journalists reporting from the ground are now struggling to stay alive. Some have even had to cut back on their coverage of the war, now in its 22nd month, with one journalist saying “we have no energy left due to hunger”.

The hunger crisis has affected virtually everyone in the Gaza Strip, with the UN describing their staff as “walking corpses”.

STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD

So, what has Israel announced now?

Facing intense international criticism, Israel, on Sunday, announced a limited pause in fighting in three populated areas of Gaza for 10 hours a day as part of a series of steps that it says would give the United Nations and other aid agencies secure land routes to tackle a deepening hunger crisis.

The Israel Defense Forces said it would begin a tactical pause in Gaza City, Deir al-Balah and Muwasi, three areas of the territory with large populations, to “increase the scale of humanitarian aid” entering the Gaza Strip. It said the pause would begin every day at 10 am local time, effective Sunday, and continue until further notice.

A pro-Palestinian activist holds a placard as they protest over hunger crisis in Gaza, along Sea Point Promenade in Cape Town, South Africa. Reuters

And following the announcement, airdrops began in the region with Israel, Jordan, and the UAE airdropping 28 aid packages. The Jordanian military said its planes, working with the United Arab Emirates, had delivered 25 tonnes of aid in three parachute drops over Gaza on Sunday. Moreover, truckloads of flour were also seen arriving in northern Gaza through the Zikim area crossing from Israel, according to AFP journalists.

Will this improve the situation in Gaza?

The answer, according to aid agencies, is that it won’t be enough. NGOs note that these steps may help ease access but as mass starvation is already underway, much more is needed. Groups have called for a full ceasefire in order to get civilians the help they need.

UNICEF spokesman Joe English told CNN: “We do airdrops in places around the world but it works where there are remote communities in big, wide open spaces. That’s not the case in the Gaza Strip.”

STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD

Other aid agencies also noted that Israel’s move to allow for aid drops is merely a “grotesque distraction” from the horror that is unfolding on the ground level. Ciarán Donnelly, of the International Rescue Committee, said aid drops could “never deliver the volume or the quality” of aid needed.

Humanitarian aid is dropped on the Gaza Strip as pictured from a position along the border in southern Israel on July 27. AFP

The head of the UNRWA, Philippe Lazzarini, also noted that airdrops are “expensive, inefficient, and can even kill starving civilians” if they go awry. “Driving aid through is much easier, more effective, faster, cheaper & safer. It’s more dignified for the people of Gaza.”

Moreover, it is unclear about how long it will maintain the pause, allowing for the airdrops. Humanitarians have said consistency is key to their work.

Oxfam’s regional policy chief Bushra Khalidi, welcomed Israel’s move but noted that it wasn’t sufficient. Echoing other humanitarian officials who are sceptical about the airdrops being able to tackle the hunger crisis, she told AFP, “Starvation won’t be solved by a few trucks or airdrops. What’s needed is a real humanitarian response: ceasefire, full access, all crossings open and a steady, large-scale flow of aid into Gaza. We need a permanent ceasefire, a complete lifting of the siege.”

STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD

What’s been the reaction on the ground so far?

It’s only been one day since Israel announced the pause and allowing for airdrops, which means that it will take some more time before one can see any noticeable difference. However, The Guardian noted that the price of flour had dipped 20 per cent overnight.

Palestinian walk carrying sacks of flour near Jabalia, in the northern Gaza Strip, on July 27, 2025, after trucks carrying humanitarian aid entered into northern Gaza coming from the Zikim border crossing. AFP

Doctors have also warned that resolving this crisis is far from easy. People who are suffering from acute malnutrition need specialised treatment, as they can develop refeeding syndrome if they resume eating normally after a prolonged period of hunger. “All of these folks who have been deprived for so long, we worry about the complications that they may have developed,” Dr Thaer Ahmad, a doctor who has worked on medical missions in Gaza, told The Guardian.

With inputs from agencies

People surround the body of a Palestinian woman who was killed while seeking aid at a Gaza Humanitarian Foundation distribution point in Gaza on Sunday. Eyad Baba/AFP/Getty Images

As the Israeli military began what it called a “tactical pause” in operations in three parts of Gaza, a dozen people were reported to have been killed while trying to get food aid from a distribution point in central Gaza on Sunday.

Al-Awda Hospital said it received 12 bodies, including those of four children and one woman, and treated more than 100 people who had been injured after Israeli forces opened fire near an aid point operated by the controversial Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.

It’s unclear whether the incident occurred before the tactical pause came into effect at 10 a.m. local time, nor whether it was inside the area covered by the pause.

The Israel Defense Forces told CNN on Sunday that it was “not aware of any casualties” after its troops fired what it described as “warning shots” near an aid distribution site. The military claimed a “gathering of suspects” had endangered its troops in the area.

“The warning shots were not fired at the aid distribution site, but at a distance of hundreds of meters away from it, prior to its opening hours,” the IDF said.

More victims arrive at hospitals: There have also been further casualties among people seeking aid in northern Gaza, according to hospital officials.

At least 11 bodies have been brought into Al-Shifa Hospital since Saturday afternoon from the area used by aid convoys coming in from the Zikim crossing, according to Mohammed Abu Salmiya, the hospital’s director.

Abu Salmiya told CNN that 120 injured people had also arrived at the hospital.

The Palestinian Red Crescent said its field hospital in the north had received two bodies and 54 wounded people after “the targeting of civilians waiting for aid in the Zikim area” in the north-west of Gaza Strip and an airstrike in Gaza City.

This post has been updated with a response from the IDF.