![Displaced Palestinians shelter at a school in Remal neighborhood, struggling to meet basic needs amid ongoing Israeli attacks in Gaza City, Gaza on April 29, 2025. [Mahmoud Abu Hamda - Anadolu Agency]](https://i0.wp.com/www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/AA-20250430-37797010-37797005-STRUGGLING_FOR_SURVIVAL_DISPLACED_PALESTINIANS_TAKE_SHELTER_IN_GAZA_SCHOOL-1.jpg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1)
Hamas said yesterday that the Netanyahu government’s continued use of starvation as a weapon in the Gaza Strip is a “war crime” showing “disregard” for the international community. The resistance movement added that this is also a challenge to international judicial institutions.
“The occupation state continues its siege of the Gaza Strip for the 60th consecutive day, closing all crossings to the entry of essential supplies, including food, water, medicine and fuel,” said Hamas. “The famine is intensifying as food stocks run out and are bombed, as part of the brutal genocidal war waged by the Israeli army against the Strip.”
The statement from the movement noted the comments of UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini, in which he revealed the occupation army’s use of UNRWA employees as human shields during arrests. “This confirms the brutality of this rogue entity that denies human values, exceeds all levels of criminality, and deliberately and systematically targets humanitarian organisations operating in the Gaza Strip,” Hamas pointed out.
READ: Israel’s Smotrich says war will not end ‘until hundreds of thousands of Gazans leave’
It called on the international community, led by the UN Security Council, to put pressure on Israel to lift the blockade on more than two million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and “end the systematic starvation crime that continues before the eyes of the world.”
It renewed its call to Arab and Islamic countries, their people and the free people of the world “to take urgent action to provide relief to our people in the Gaza Strip, and to take action at all levels to demand the opening of the crossings, allow the entry of aid and relief supplies, and to support and reinforce the steadfastness of our people on their land.”
Israel has closed the Gaza Strip’s crossings to the entry of food, relief, medical aid and other essential goods since 2 March, causing a significant deterioration in the humanitarian situation of the Palestinians, according to government, human rights and international reports.
READ: No shortage of bombs, but scarcity of everything else to starve Gazans: Palestine