At least 101 individuals have died from starvation during the conflict, say Palestinian officials, with 80 children among the deceased, most of them in recent weeks.

Over 800 people have been killed in attempts to access food in Gaza, primarily due to shootings by Israeli soldiers stationed near an aid organization funded by the United States.

Muhammad Zakariya Ayyoub al-Matouq, a one-year-old baby in Gaza, is on the brink of severe malnutrition as the humanitarian crisis intensifies due to continued Israeli blockade and attacks. Source: Getty / Anadolu

The United Nations has rejected this system as inherently unsafe and a violation of humanitarian neutrality principles, which are necessary to ensure that distribution succeeds.

“We are seeing the last gasp of a humanitarian system built on humanitarian principles,” Guterres told the UN Security Council. “That system is being denied the conditions to function.”

Israeli activists take part in a protest against the war in the Gaza Strip, Israel’s measures regarding food distribution and the forced displacement of Palestinians, in Tel Aviv, Israel. Source: AP / Ohad Zwigenberg

The Norwegian Refugee Council, which supported hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza in the first year of the war, said its aid stocks were now depleted and some of its own staff were starving.

The head of the UN Palestinian refugee agency said on Tuesday its staff, as well as doctors and humanitarian workers, were fainting on duty in Gaza due to hunger and exhaustion.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on Tuesday images of civilians killed during the distribution of aid were “unbearable” and urged Israel to deliver on pledges to improve the situation.

Food and medicine shortages

Israeli military statistics showed an average of 146 trucks of aid per day had entered Gaza over the course of the war.

Palestinians gather flour from the ground after an airstrike on a warehouse. Source: AAP / Hasan Alzaanin / TASS / Sipa USA

The US has said a minimum of 600 trucks per day are needed to feed Gaza’s population.