Gaza’s main hospital is overwhelmed with children in pain from malnutrition

By MOHAMMED JAHJOUH WAFAA SHURAFA SARAH EL DEEB and SAM MEDNICK KHAN YOUNIS Gaza Strip AP Grabbing her daughter s feeble arm Asmaa al-Arja pulls a shirt over the -year-old s protruding ribs and swollen belly The child lies on a hospital bed heaving then wails uncontrollably throwing her arms around her own shoulders as if to console herself This isn t the first time Mayar has been in a Gaza hospital battling malnutrition yet this -day stint is the longest She has celiac syndrome an autoimmune disorder that means she can t eat gluten and requires special food But there s little left for her to eat in the embattled enclave after months of war and Israel s punishing blockade and she can t digest what s available She demands diapers soy milk and she requirements special food This is not available because of confines closures If it s available it is expensive I can t afford it her mother mentioned as she sat next to Mayar at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis Mayar Al-Arja right and -month-old Yousef Al-Najjar both suffering from malnutrition are cared for by their mothers in a clinic in Nasser Hospital Khan Younis Gaza on Wednesday May AP Photo Abdel Kareem Hana The Al-Arja family eats lentil soup inside their tent in a camp for displaced Palestinians in Muwasi Khan Younis Gaza Wednesday May AP Photo Abdel Kareem Hana Nouf Al-Arja who suffers from malnutrition cooks for her family inside their tent in a camp for displaced Palestinians in Muwasi Khan Younis Gaza Wednesday May AP Photo Abdel Kareem Hana Najia Al-Najjar feeds her -month-old baby Yousef who suffers from malnutrition at a clinic in Nasser hospital Khan Younis Gaza Wednesday May AP Photo Abdel Kareem Hana Show Caption of Mayar Al-Arja right and -month-old Yousef Al-Najjar both suffering from malnutrition are cared for by their mothers in a clinic in Nasser Hospital Khan Younis Gaza on Wednesday May AP Photo Abdel Kareem Hana Expand Mayar is among the more than children who have been treated for malnutrition this year according to the U N children s agency and food defense experts say tens of thousands of cases are expected in the coming year Experts also warn the territory could plunge into famine if Israel doesn t stop its military campaign and fully lift its blockade but the World Wellness Organization declared last week that people are already starving Everywhere you look people are hungry They point their fingers to their mouths showing that they need something to eat commented Nestor Owomuhangi the representative of the United Nations Population Fund for the Palestinian territories The worst has already arrived in Gaza Israel eases blockade but little aid reaches Palestinians For more than two months Israel has banned all food medicine and other goods from entering the territory that is home to particular million Palestinians as it carries out waves of airstrikes and ground operations Palestinians in Gaza rely almost entirely on outside aid to survive because Israel s offensive has destroyed almost all the territory s food production capabilities After weeks of insisting Gaza had enough food Israel relented in the face of international pressure and began allowing dozens of humanitarian trucks into the territory this week including specific carrying baby food Children are already dying from malnutrition and there are more babies in Gaza now who will be in mortal danger if they don t get fast access to the nutrition supplies needed to save their lives stated Tess Ingram of the U N children s agency But U N agencies say the amount is woefully insufficient compared to around trucks a day that entered during a latest ceasefire and that are necessary to meet basic requirements And they have struggled to retrieve the aid and distribute it blaming complicated Israeli military procedures and the breakdown of law and order inside the territory On Wednesday a U N official announced more than a dozen trucks arrived at warehouses in central Gaza The official spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the press That appeared to be the first aid to in fact reach a distribution point since the blockade was lifted Israel accuses Hamas of siphoning off aid without providing evidence and plans to roll out a new aid distribution system within days U N agencies and aid groups say the new system would fall far short of mounting necessities force much of the population to flee again in order to be closer to distribution sites and violate humanitarian principles by forcing people to move to receive the aid rather than delivering it based on need to where people live Hamas has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United States Canada and the European Union On top of not being able to find or afford the food that Mayar requirements her mother disclosed chronic diarrhea linked to celiac sickness has kept the child in and out of hospital all year The toddler whose two pigtails are brittle a sign of malnutrition weighs kilograms pounds according to doctors That s about half what healthy girl her age should But it s getting harder to help her as supplies like baby formula are disappearing say vitality staff Hospitals are hanging by a thread dealing with mass casualties from Israeli strikes Packed hospital feeding centers are overwhelmed with patients We have nothing at Nasser Hospital declared Dr Ahmed al-Farrah who mentioned his exigency center for malnourished children is at full limit Supplies are running out people are living off scraps and the situation is catastrophic for babies and pregnant women he mentioned Everything watered down to make it last In the feeding center of the hospital malnourished mothers console their hungry children various so frail their spines jut out of their skin their legs swollen from lack food The Integrated Food Assurance Phase Classification a leading international authority on the severity of hunger crises has warned that there could be specific cases of malnourished children between now and March In addition nearly pregnant and breastfeeding women will need recovery for acute malnutrition in the coming months Mai Namleh and her -month-old son who live in a tent are both malnourished She needed to wean him off of breastmilk because she barely has any but she has so little else to give him She gives him heavily watered-down formula to ration it and sometimes offers him starch to quiet his hunger screams I try to pass it for milk to stop him screaming she commented of the formula An aid group gave her around packets of nutritional supplements but they ran out in two days as she shared them with family and friends she revealed In another tent Nouf al-Arja says she paid a fortune for a hard-to-find kilogram about pounds of red lentils The family cooks it with a lot of water so it lasts unsure what they will eat next The mother of four has lost kilograms pounds and struggles to focus saying she constantly feels dizzy Both she and her -year-old daughter are malnourished doctors stated She s worried her baby boy born four months earlier and massively underweight will suffer the same fate as she struggles to breastfeed I keep looking for infant food so I can feed him There is nothing she revealed El Deeb published from Beirut and Mednick from Tel Aviv Israel Follow AP s war coverage at https apnews com hub israel-hamas-war