Published On 7/3/2026
|
Last update: 13:12 (Mecca time)
While chocolate and potato chips may seem available on the sidewalks of markets in the Gaza Strip, “eggs and fresh fruit” have become a luxury that most families cannot afford.
This shocking paradox was revealed by Save the Children, warning that malnutrition is now devastating the bodies of about 245,000 Palestinian children, a thousand days after the Israeli war of genocide on the Gaza Strip.
Extermination of children in the language of numbers
In Gaza, everyone talks about living through a brutal war and a catastrophic humanitarian situation, but what is shocking is what was revealed by a recent report of the United Nations Commission of Inquiry (COI), which states that the Israeli authorities and security forces deliberately targeted Palestinian children, leading to genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes in Gaza.
In terms of numbers, at least 21,000 children were martyred at the hands of Israeli forces during the war, but the real number is likely to be much higher with an unknown number of children buried under the rubble.
The number of displaced children exceeds 800,000, or about 80% of the children in Gaza, with more than 7,000 children separated from their families, according to the Site Management Group (SMC).
625,000 school-age children in Gaza lost 3 years of formal education, and most of them suffered interruption of schooling due to successive escalations.
Since the “ceasefire” was announced last October, another 275 children have been martyred at the hands of Israeli forces.
In the most recent attacks, it was reported that an 8-year-old child was martyred when an Israeli drone struck tents housing displaced people in Deir al-Balah in central Gaza last Monday, while a 13-year-old girl was martyred by shrapnel from an Israeli artillery shelling over the weekend in southern Gaza. Last month, Raghad Ashour (18 years old) was killed in an Israeli raid on her way to take her high school exams.
As for the psychological dimension, the ongoing violence continues to terrorize the children of Gaza, as the United Nations Population Fund reported that 96% of children feel that death is imminent.
Displacement poses another dilemma, as many families have been forced to move multiple times in the past 1,000 days, with estimates that more than 370,000 homes have been damaged in the war, equivalent to approximately 77% of the total housing units in Gaza.
This suffering is exacerbated by the Israeli authorities’ prohibition of construction equipment and machinery from entering the Gaza Strip, in addition to pushing the Palestinians in Gaza beyond the “yellow line,” which represents less than 40% of the Gaza Strip’s territory.
The “yellow line” has also reportedly shifted, following the expansion of the area under Israeli military control and the space available for Palestinian families being further reduced.
Paradoxes of Gaza
Hunger is also afflicting children in Gaza, as it is estimated that 245,000 children in Gaza are at risk of malnutrition or are affected by it, with the flow of humanitarian aid remaining limited, while the available food lacks the nutritional and healthy diversity that children need, and the prices of food items are unaffordable for the majority of families, according to Save the Children.
The organization revealed that food items such as chips and chocolate are widely available in Gaza, but nutritious items such as fresh fruit and eggs are often too expensive for most families.
Save the Children’s regional director for the Middle East, North Africa and Eastern Europe, Ahmed Al-Hindawi, said: “In each of the past thousand days, the world has failed towards nearly a million children in Gaza, by not intervening to stop the killing and maiming of children.”
Save the Children called for full accountability for crimes committed against children, the immediate suspension of arms transfers to Israel, and a guarantee of refraining from supporting or sustaining illegal practices in the occupied Palestinian territories.
Although more than 275 children have been killed by Israeli forces since the ceasefire 9 months ago, the world still ignores the voices and needs of children, as they simply demand to be treated like any other child in the world, according to Save the Children.
These calls come after years in which children’s fragile bodies continued to be blown to bits and pieces by bombs and missiles, which the world sold to the government of Israel, and while children died of hunger and disease, the government of Israel failed to fulfill its legal obligations to provide humanitarian access, including enough nutritious food, to Gaza.
