'Skeletons draped in skin': Doctor describes the state of children in Gaza

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Like many other doctors in Gaza, Dr Majed Jaber feels helpless amid Israel's continuing attacks on health centres and a lack of medical supplies after an 11-week blockade on the entry of aid.

Dr Jaber, 28, worked at the neonatal intensive care unit at the European Hospital in Khan Younis before it was bombed by the Israeli army on May 13.

“The hospital I was working at was bombed not once, but repeatedly,” Dr Jaber said.

The hospital's infrastructure is largely destroyed and the doctors there have no access to supplies or medication as Israeli troops and army vehicles remain stationed outside.

“We have seen it many times, injured patients losing limbs, bleeding to death. Even though we had the ability to save them, now we're just bystanders to all the tragedies that have been ongoing,” Dr Jaber said.

Among the most painful sights, he added, are the children suffering from starvation because of the lack of food caused by the Israeli blockade.

Gaza's Health Ministry has reported at least 57 child deaths from malnutrition since the blockade began on March 2. The UN's humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher warned on Tuesday that thousands of babies could die soon without immediate intervention.

“The children of Gaza today look like skeletons draped in skin,” Dr Jaber said. Severe malnutrition has become the “new normal”, he added.

“I’ve seen children so fragile, they can’t even chew food properly or digest their mother’s milk.”

These babies need special formula to provide them with the nutrition they require, but this is expensive and almost non-existent in the Gaza Strip, he said.

Faced with mounting pressure from its allies over the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza, Israel on Monday announced that it was allowing aid deliveries to resume. Since then, about 90 lorries have delivered "nutrition supplies, flour, medicines, and other critical aid to multiple destinations within Gaza", UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said on Thursday.

Even before the war between Israel and Hamas began in October 2023, Gaza needed at least 600 lorries of supplies each day to support its 2.3 million residents.

After 19 months of devastating bombardment and repeated displacement, the severe scarcity of essentials is having catastrophic effects on the population, Dr Jaber said.

“This is not only physical destruction, it’s emotional annihilation,” he said.