Two million people are starving in the Gaza Strip, and the deliberate blocking of humanitarian aid is increasing the risk of famine, warned the head of the World Health Organization.

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the WHO and other UN agencies are ready to deliver aid to the Palestinian territories if and when they are allowed to enter.

Israel says the blockade, imposed on March 2, is meant to force the Palestinian militant group Hamas to make concessions.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said today that Israel must prevent starvation in Gaza for “diplomatic reasons” after his government announced it would allow limited humanitarian aid to enter.

“Two months after the start of the latest blockade, two million people are starving,” Tedros said, while 160,000 tons of food “are blocked at the border, just minutes away.”

“The risk of famine in Gaza is increasing with the deliberate withholding of humanitarian aid, including food, under the ongoing blockade,” he added, quoted by AFP.

In his speech at the opening of the annual World Health Assembly, Tedros said that escalating hostilities, evacuation orders, shrinking space for humanitarian aid, and the blockade of Gaza “are leading to an influx of wounded and dead into a health system that is already on its knees.”

“People are dying from preventable diseases while medicines wait at the border, and attacks on hospitals are depriving people of medical care and deterring them from seeking it,” he said.

Netanyahu announced that Israel would “take control” of the entire Gaza Strip as the military continued its new intensive campaign in the war-ravaged territory, which Israel says is aimed at freeing hostages and defeating Hamas.

Tedros stressed that since November 2023, the WHO has supported the medical evacuation of over 7,300 patients, including 617 cancer patients, from the Gaza Strip.

However, over 10,000 patients still need medical evacuation from Gaza, he added.

“We urge Member States to accept more patients, and we urge Israel to allow these evacuations, as well as to allow urgently needed food and medicines,” Tedros said.

“The WHO is ready, together with our UN partners, to respond quickly to deliver assistance if and when permitted. I hope that peace will prevail that will transcend generations. War is not the answer,” the WHO leader concluded. | BGNES