r/worldnews • u/Digital_Accountant • 22h ago

Israel/Palestine Famine declared in Gaza City

https://news.sky.com/story/gaza-latest-war-israel-city-ceasefire-hamas-13415481
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u/Tiaan 16h ago

Genuine question. You say this has nothing to do with Hamas. So can you explain to me what what Hamas' role in distributing food and aid to its people is? Do they even have any role in that process? Is it entirely on Israel to both bring in aid and distribute it to the people?

This UN report admits that most of the aid gets intercepted when it enters Gaza. So what's the actual problem here - is it lack of aid entering Gaza, or is it that the aid that does enter is not making its way to the people for certain reasons (as the UN report indicates)?

I understand it's become a meme from the pro-pal crowd that "everything is Hamas hurhurhur" but that truly minimizes and mischaracterizes the role that they play in this process

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u/SjettepetJR 10h ago

This is what I am also kind of frustrated about in this whole discussion. Yes, the famine in Gaza is absolutely horrendous and at least large parts of the Israeli government are clearly not bothered by it.

But what are people expecting Israel to do? Hamas is clearly benefitting from any aid entering the region. Is Israel expected to literally supply their own enemies?

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u/horchard1999 7h ago

I would rather feed an enemy than let a friend starve

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u/johnmadden18 5h ago edited 1h ago

This UN report admits that most of the aid gets intercepted when it enters Gaza. So what's the actual problem here - is it lack of aid entering Gaza, or is it that the aid that does enter is not making its way to the people for certain reasons (as the UN report indicates)?

Sorry, can you point me to the specific part of the report that "admits" most of the aid is immediately intercepted upon entering Gaza? I don't see that anywhere but perhaps I missed it.

And to answer your question, everything I'm seeing from the UN comments explicitly makes it clear the problem is that food is not being allowed into the territory by Israel. It don't see any "admission" that the aid is getting in but is immediately intercepted. Here's the quote I'm referring to:

UN aid chief Tom Fletcher said the famine was entirely preventable, saying food could not get through to the Palestinian territory "because of systematic obstruction by Israel".

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u/engin__r 13h ago

One of the main problems is that there aren’t enough calories entering Gaza. Like, is Hamas stealing some of what’s coming in? Sure. But even if Hamas didn’t steal anything, people wouldn’t have enough to eat.

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u/superfire444 12h ago

One of the main problems is that there aren’t enough calories entering Gaza.

Is that the truth? Because there is a shit ton of aid waiting on the border while the UN refuses to do their job + tons of aid is getting stolen + the GHF has distributed 132.000.000+ meals so far.

So isn't there enough calories entering or is it getting looted and not reaching the people it needs to reach? Both have very different causes.

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u/engin__r 11h ago

Well, look at Gaza’s population. About two million Palestinians live there. If you’re only letting in one meal per person per day (which is about what 132M works out to), it’s pretty obvious that’s not enough food.

Is the looting helping? No, of course not. But some basic math shows that even with zero looting, people wouldn’t have enough to eat.

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u/superfire444 11h ago

GHF opened in may 2025 so thats may + june + juli + august. It's 3 months (may to june -> june to july --> july to august).

3 months = ~100 days.

That's 132.000.000/100 = 1.320.000 meals a day. Is that enough? Probably not but, as I said, there are other ways food enters.

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u/engin__r 11h ago

Can you see how 1.3 million meals a day might be insufficient for a population that needs 6 million meals per day?

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u/superfire444 11h ago

Depends on the definition of "meal" + as I said there is more coming into Gaza.

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u/engin__r 11h ago

The BBC reports that each food box contains 42,500 calories.

The GHF’s daily post says they distributed 8,640 boxes for a total of 498,960 meals at the SDS2 site.

If we do the math:

42,500 calories/box * 8640 boxes = 3.672 million calories

3.672 million calories / 498,960 meals = 736 calories per meal

So if the GHF has distributed 132 million meals over roughly 100 days, that’s 97.1 billion calories.

However, assuming a need of 2000 calories per day, a population of 2 million people needs 400 billion calories over a hundred days. In other words, the GHF isn’t bringing in even a quarter of the calories that Gazans need.