14,000 babies could die in Gaza within 48 hours: UN

Thousands of children in Gaza are at risk of imminent death after a nearly three-month total Israeli blockade on the besieged enclave, which has spread famine, the United Nations relief chief warns.

That has put 14,000 babies at risk of dying in the next 48 hours, Tom Fletcher said in an interview with the BBC on Tuesday.

“We need to flood the Gaza Strip with humanitarian aid,” the UN’s undersecretary-general for humanitarian affairs said, describing the situation as “chilling”.

All food, medicine and other life-saving aid had been blocked by Israel from entering Gaza beginning on March 2. As of Monday, a trickle of aid was authorised to enter for the first time since then but was not immediately distributed.

Addressing the European Humanitarian Forum in Brussels on Tuesday, Philippe Lazzarini, the head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), said relief organisations have run out of words to describe the horrors unfolding in Gaza at Israel’s hands.

“But the worst in all this is that we are confronted with a situation: If there is political will, the war can stop. The siege being imposed on Gaza can be lifted,” Lazzarini said.

Since early March, at least 57 children are reported to have died from malnutrition.

A UN-backed Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) assessment says more than 93 percent of children in Gaza, or about 930,000, are at risk of famine

UNRWA Director of Health Akihiro Seita added on Tuesday that the situation is getting “exponentially” worse and may soon arrive at a point that is “beyond our control”.

Israel told the UN on Tuesday that it would allow the entry of 100 trucks carrying humanitarian aid, a day after it said it allowed only nine aid trucks into the enclave for the first time in more than 80 days.

But UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said no humanitarian aid has been distributed yet, despite more supplies being dropped off on the Palestinian side of the Karem Abu Salem (Kerem Shalom) crossing.

The Israeli moves have been roundly slammed for fulfilling only a “drop in the ocean” of the humanitarian needs in Gaza, which has been largely reduced to rubble by Israeli air strikes and ground operations, which were expanded at the weekend.

Israeli attacks continue to kill dozens of Palestinians, including many children, each day while what’s left of infrastructure and aid supplies are being destroyed.

The municipality of Deir el-Balah in central Gaza announced on Tuesday that a major well, the last remaining source of drinking water in the area, was destroyed along with its generator in an Israeli strike.

This comes as more than 100,000 Palestinians have been driven out of their homes and shelters in the past several days alone, according to the UN, and have nowhere safe to go as they face famine.

The Israeli army on Tuesday bombed the Nasser Medical Complex in southern Gaza’s Khan Younis as well, hitting life-saving medical supplies and causing widespread destruction across the hospital’s different facilities, including oxygen lines and a laboratory.

(With inputs from Al Jazeera)