Caroline Hawley
Diplomatic correspondent

This isn’t the first time that there have been warnings of famine in Gaza.

So, we asked the World Food Programme (WFP) – the UN body tasked with making sure the world is fed - to explain how serious the situation is now.

“Our emergency stocks are gone, drained by the closure of the border crossings,” WFP country director Antoine Renard told us.

“Parents spend all their days trying to find food for their children. People are searching through rubbish to find scraps. They were crushing old macaroni and mixing it with water to make a kind of bread.”

He says that “a very few” locally produced vegetables make it to market. But the prices are “astronomical” and there are no longer any working bakeries.

Earlier this week, the World Health Organization – quoting Gaza’s health ministry – said that 57 children are reported to have died from malnutrition since the start of March.

Renard spoke of a “morbid countdown.”

“Malnutrition is increasing,” he said. “That makes the whole body weaker and more prone to disease. Some people, the ones that are out of sight, are no doubt starving at this point.”

Image source, Reuters

Charity Islamic Relief Worldwide says it is no longer able to distribute food or nutritional supplements in Gaza "as our supplies have finally run out" because of Israel's blockade.

"No food has been allowed in. No medicine. No fuel to keep hospitals and bakeries going. Not even tents for displaced families, painkillers for wounded patients, or incubators for newborn babies. Young children are now dying from hunger and disease," the charity says.

"The catastrophic suffering is entirely preventable. Aid trucks can deliver food, medicine and other supplies as soon as Israel reopens the crossings."

The charity says it is still able to support more than 20,000 orphaned children and their guardians with cash payments, provide maternal care to hundreds of pregnant women, and clean dozens of shelters to prevent diseases from spreading.

Israel's military assault "has turned the region into the most difficult and dangerous place in the world to deliver humanitarian aid", the charity says, calling on international governments to put pressure on Israel to end the siege.

"As starvation spreads and more people die every day, history will judge harshly anyone that does not act immediately."

Our Gaza correspondent Rushdi Abualouf in Cairo says people in Gaza have "run out of everything", and that 25% of the water people are drinking has been found to be undrinkable, according to local authorities in Gaza.

"There are very few places where people can locally grow some fruits and vegetables," Abualouf says, and that flour is running out.

He says most community kitchens, which used to provide free meals for people, are running out of all essentials to cook food.

"Even if you have a lot of money in Gaza right now it doesn't matter," Abualouf says as it's impossible to find food to feed your family.

"Gaza is at the edge of famine, I am talking to people every day, people are starving.

"I have been talking to people throughout the war over the last two years, this if the first time where I feel people really are at the edge of famine," he adds.

Verifying video of child casualties at Gaza hospitalpublished at 17:23 British Summer Time 15 May

17:23 BST 15 May

By Richard Irvine-Brown and Emma Pengelly

So far, we’ve verified four videos showing the arrival and treatment of at least eight children at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, following reported Israeli air strikes in the area.

In one video, two injured children are lifted from parked vehicles outside the emergency department of the hospital and hurriedly carried inside.

In a second video - which we know was filmed in the same location because we see the same building in the background - a medical worker is holding a child with severe head injuries, wrapped in a blanket in his arms.

Two other videos we’ve authenticated were filmed inside the hospital and show seven children on beds. They are conscious, some crying, some bleeding.

We’re confident they’re inside Nasser Hospital because at least one of the children was in the first video we verified, and we've matched the floor tiling to other footage we know was filmed in Nasser last year.

We also know from searching three frames of each video, plus looking at some of their filenames and HTML data, the footage was first shared publicly online between 03:00 and 04:00 local time.

However, we can’t say what caused the injuries.

Image source, Telegram

Wyre Davies
Middle East Correspondent in Jerusalem

The Israeli government has doubled down on its insistence that there is “no shortage” of food in Gaza and that the “real crisis is Hamas looting and selling aid”.

David Mencer, a spokesman for the Office of the Israeli prime minister, told journalists that the only famine in Gaza was “a famine of the truth”.

His comments came amid growing evidence that Israel’s 10-week total blockade of the Palestinian enclave was having an increasingly detrimental humanitarian impact.

Rejecting repeated claims from UN organisations that Israel was restricting aid and food as “leverage, part of a military strategy”, Mencer said the only hunger in Gaza was “hunger orchestrated by Hamas”.

That’s despite assertions from various UN bodies, and international aid organisations on the ground in Gaza, that its population of 2.1 million people are at “critical risk of famine” and that rising rates of malnutrition could have an impact on an entire generation.

Israel has given few details about an American-backed plan to allow some aid into Gaza, through what would be a privately funded mechanism, known as the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).

Mencer said the key element would be to “bypass Hamas” who he accused of stealing aid and “creating hunger to gain international sympathy”.

It’s not clear how or when the GHF initiative would start, even if it was given Israel government approval, but given the enormity of the task, they would almost certainly have to rely on existing UN mechanisms and infrastructure.

Mallory Moench
Live reporter

Salma Altaweel, a support manager for charity Norwegian Refugee Council who sent a message earlier saying she is weak from hunger, says “things became even worse” yesterday when the Israeli military issued sweeping evacuation orders in north Gaza.

Under evacuation orders are the Islamic University, Al-Shifa Hospital and three former schools. Israel alleges the buildings are being used by Hamas, but local authorities and aid agencies, including Salma, say they are shelters for thousands of civilians.

"Now people are walking in the streets with tears in their eyes. They don't know where to go with their kids or their elderly people. They don’t have the strength to keep moving, they are simply too hungry," she says.

"This is our reality and the world needs to hear us."

Alice Cuddy
Reporting from Jerusalem

In an earlier post, we reported from a food kitchen in Gaza City, where six-year-old Ismail Abu Odeh was trying to get a meal for his family, but returned in tears.

We have been speaking to others who gathered there today, who tell us they struggled to find food in the markets, and couldn’t afford items that were available.

“We can’t get hold of meat, vegetables, anything,” a 47-year-old man in the queue says. “We rely on the food we get from charities, from community kitchens, and from kind people.”

A woman, Um Al-Abed Abu Oheh, says it feels like a “true famine”.

"We want something that can fill our children," she says.

“You can only say we’re surviving because we haven’t died yet. But we’re not alive. We’re dead here in Gaza.”

Nurse in Gaza says medication is being rationed because there isn't enoughpublished at 16:23 British Summer Time 15 May

16:23 BST 15 May

By Nick Beake

Israel is not allowing international journalists into Gaza, which really complicates our attempts to establish the scale of the lack of food in the territory.

Some Israeli government officials concede Gazans are going hungry but deny there is starvation.

“It's just ridiculous the prices of food,” Canadian nurse Amy Low tells us from al-Mawasi, west of the southern city of Khan Younis.

She says shelves are almost completely bare and prices of $10 (£7) a kilo for tomatoes and $20 (£15) a kilo for onions are being demanded for any remaining produce.

Amy, who is the medical lead for Doctors Without Borders (MSF) at her location, says the number of expectant mothers being put on their malnutrition programme every week has roughly doubled compared with when she was in Gaza last year.

As for the Israeli block on medicines, it’s having a particular impact on people with chronic conditions, such as diabetes, she says.

“We've had to ration our medication for people because we don't have enough to give them. We usually give a one-month supply but we can’t now."

Instead, patients are being told to come back in a fortnight to see if any more supplies have been found.

Many people decide unilaterally to halve their dosage to try to tide them over, but - as Amy says - this reduces the effectiveness of their treatment and puts them at further risk.

Alice Cuddy
Reporting from Jerusalem

We’ve been speaking over the phone to the director of Gaza’s Nasser hospital in Khan Younis, who says the facility has taken in 130 injured people and 40 bodies since yesterday.

“The bombing last night in Khan Younis was brutal. It felt like the beginning of the war,” Atef al-Hout says.

He describes many of the injuries as “critical” and says operations are needed.

The Israeli blockade means there is a shortage of medical supplies at the hospital, including gauze and pain killers, he says.

As we reported earlier, the Hamas-run health ministry has announced that the European Hospital in Khan Younis is out of service following an Israeli air strike.

Al-Hout says Nasser relied on the European Hospital to “ease the pressure” on it.

“Now it’s out of service, all the pressure is on us,” he says.

He adds that his staff do not feel safe “even inside the hospital”, which has also been hit in an Israeli strike this week.

The Israeli military has repeatedly attacked what it claims are Hamas command-and-control centres based in hospitals or gunmen sheltering there. Hamas denies using hospitals in this way.

Mallory Moench
Live reporter

Earlier, we heard from Mai Elawawda, who works for the British charity Medical Aid for Palestinians, about the lack of food and water in Gaza.

She says in a message from south Gaza that the healthcare system “is on the brink of total collapse,” with a lack of medical supplies and a growing number of patients. Fuel shortages “have paralysed every facet of life” and “all aspects of life in Gaza are at a complete standstill".

She warns that any expansion of Israel’s war will "bring unimaginable suffering and death to countless people” and calls on the international community to act urgently to end it.

"We fear we are rapidly approaching a time when it will no longer be possible to deliver life-saving assistance to those in need,” she says.

Alice Cuddy
Reporting from Jerusalem

Image source, Supplied

As we reported earlier, it is believed that up to 23 hostages in Gaza are still alive.

I’ve just been speaking on the phone to Yehuda Cohen, whose son Nimrod, an Israeli soldier, was kidnapped by Hamas on 7 October 2023.

Two hostages released in the ceasefire earlier this year said they were held with Nimrod, and Yehuda spotted his son’s tattoo in a Hamas video.

“He’s there, he’s alive, surviving, struggling,” he tells me.

Asked how he is coping without any contact with his son, Yehuda says: “The more important question is how Nimrod is - we are worried, but we are free. We have enough air, water and food. We are worried about him, and we want it to end.”

He says he is now putting his hopes on US President Donald Trump to "force [Prime Minister] Netanyahu to go for a permanent ceasefire and a hostage deal.”

“The message has been the same for the last 19 months,” he says. “We are fighting for you Nimrod… We are doing all we can, and we will never stop until you have been released and until your life has been secured.”

Read more about the stories of people taken hostage by Hamas.

Caroline Hawley
Diplomatic correspondent

Some Israelis are deeply disturbed at the conduct of the Gaza war.

Yael Noy heads the charity Road to Recovery, which drives sick Palestinians to hospital appointments in Israel.

Five of its volunteers were killed on 7 October, two more were kidnapped and then murdered.

Yael still mourns them but also hears daily from frightened and desperate families in Gaza who she used to help before the war.

She told me she’s now ashamed to say that she’s Israeli.

"I’m begging the world, please help stop this war now. It’s being waged in my name. I want to be a good person. But my taxes are being spent on a war that has killed thousands of kids. We are carrying out genocide now. And I can’t talk about it in Israel,” she says.

"We must stop the war, bring the hostages back and save our soldiers and their citizens."

Her biggest fear is that, if the conflict doesn’t stop, her 18-year old son will soon be a soldier, taking part in a "terrible, immoral" war.

Adnan El-Bursh
BBC Arabic

People in Gaza have been grinding pulses and animal feed to make bread - a staple food in every household in the Gaza Strip.

“This is the only alternative we have for bread, to quell our hunger. Children shouldn’t get hungry. They didn’t do anything,” Abu Abdallah Shtewi, who has a small mill in his shop, says.

But even finding and grinding these alternatives is difficult, due to the tight siege that Israel has been imposing for more than 10 weeks.

Alaa Hamouda, who has been displaced from Jabalia in the north of the Gaza Strip, says: “We only find pasta, bulgur wheat and animal feed that we grind to make something similar to bread out of it.”

“This type of bread smells bad and has a bitter taste. We force ourselves to eat it so we can survive,” he adds.

Alice Cuddy
Reporting from Jerusalem

In addition to calls and messages, the BBC relies on Palestinian journalists in Gaza to report on what’s happening there.

While at a food distribution point in Gaza City today, a camera operator saw six-year-old Ismail Abu Odeh pushing through the crowd to try to get food.

He later caught up with Ismail and his mother, Kefaya, at a nearby displacement camp.

Ismail “went to bring food but couldn’t get any. While he was pushing through the crowd, the food fell on his head and he came back crying. He hasn’t eaten today,” she said.

Kefaya, who has four sons and two daughters, said her children had “become weak” because of the food shortages, and complained of "constant headaches".

“There is nothing for us to buy. The market is very expensive so even if there are goods there, we can’t afford them.”

Yolande Knell
Middle East correspondent, in Jerusalem

Image source, Reuters

Israel’s stoppage of aid to Gaza has become one of the most contested issues of the war.

It closed all crossings on 2 March, saying its aim was to put pressure on Hamas to release remaining hostages.

Israel has described its action as one of its "main pressure tools" on Hamas, which it accuses of stealing and hoarding aid – something the armed group denies.

Israel and the US have recently argued that a new aid delivery system is needed. However, the UN and its humanitarian partners have rejected their proposal, describing it as an attempt to weaponise aid. They say they have maintained strong supervision over entry and distribution of supplies during the war.

At the start of this week a report from the respected global food monitor, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, said half a million people in Gaza were facing starvation, and the entire 2.1m population was experiencing acute food insecurity.

With the planned expansion of Israel’s military offensive, a continued closure of crossings, and forced mass displacement of people, it concluded: "The risk of famine in the Gaza Strip is not just possible - it is increasingly likely.", external

However, on Wednesday, the Israeli government spokesman, David Mencer told the BBC: "There is food in Gaza, that’s our information.

"During the last hostage release pause over 25,000 aid trucks went in, markets even today are open in Gaza so there is food, there is no famine."

He also said: "We don’t dispute that there is hunger in Gaza, but we believe it is hunger caused by Hamas."

Yolande Knell
Middle East correspondent, in Jerusalem

Image source, Getty Images

During the two-month-long ceasefire this year, hundreds of aid lorries entered the Gaza Strip every day.

However, with most of Gaza’s population now reliant on handouts, food stocks quickly diminished.

According to the UN’s humanitarian office, OCHA, yesterday only about 65 community kitchens were still running, preparing about 249,000 daily meals. The manager of one tells me that operations were kept going for another week by swapping rice for cooking oil with another aid agency.

Some fresh food can still be bought in Gaza but for exorbitant prices which most simply cannot afford.

Fishermen sell seafood, and small amounts of food are still grown locally. But most agricultural land lies in areas now taken over by the Israeli military.

Shops and markets have limited numbers of dried and canned food – even expired goods are on sale.

Most everyday items have become extremely scarce including baby formula – a real problem for newborns as poor nutrition has left many new mothers unable to breastfeed.

Gazans tell us that the cost of flour is more than 50 times higher than during the ceasefire.

Some have resorted to new innovations to make bread. A coffee grinding stall in Gaza City showed the BBC how it was now selling small amounts of ground pasta and lentils.

Images are coming through of Palestinians struggling to collect food rations at a crowded distribution centre in Beit Lahia in the north of the Gaza Strip.

We're reporting people's stories inside Gaza all day today, with one man saying he "cannot move due to the severity of hunger".

As a reminder, 10 different aid agencies have told the BBC that the humanitarian situation in the territory is getting worse.

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Getty Images

Image source, Getty Images

Mallory Moench

Image source, Salma Altaweel

Salma Altaweel, support manager for charity Norwegian Refugee Council, says in a voice note from Gaza City: “I feel so weak from hunger that I can barely hold up my head.”

“If someone eats one meal a day now, they are considered lucky. This is not just happening to a few people, it’s happening to everyone in Gaza,” she says.

Most families no longer have any food at home and many have no money at all to buy the little, very expensive food that is left, she says.

Today, one kilo of flour (most bags are infested with bugs) costs $12 (£9), one kilo of rice $20 (£15) and one litre of cooking oil $30 (£22).

There is no cooking gas, and families are burning furniture and clothes just to cook a small meal, she says.

“Children cry from hunger and their mothers cry too because they have nothing to feed them.”

Paul Adams
Diplomatic correspondent

While the death toll mounts from Israeli air strikes in the southern Gaza Strip, civilians sheltering further north, in Gaza City, are bracing themselves for similar action.

For the second day in a row, residents of the Rimal neighbourhood have been warned of impending action by the Israel Defense Forces.

In a message accompanied by maps, satellite photos and the faces of seven alleged Hamas operatives, the IDF’s Arabic language spokesman issued an ultimatum.

“You have two choices,” Avichay Adraee posted on X. “Either expel them from your midst, or we will eliminate them wherever they are.”

One local resident, contacted this morning, said that some people had heeded yesterday’s Israeli instruction to evacuate.

This morning’s instructions did not repeat the order to evacuate, but warmed residents to “stay away from every area used by Hamas for your own safety.”

Many Gazans, exhausted by more than a year and a half of warnings and bombardment, are choosing to stay put.

“Where are we supposed to go?” one tells me.

Image source, Getty Images

Throughout the day, Palestinians have been sharing their stories from Gaza, and their experiences of living through 19 months of war.

Here’s a look back at what some have told us:

• Najwa, mother of five-month-old Siwar - who is in the Nasser Hospital suffering acute malnourishment - says she woke up in the middle of the night to find her daughter "crying because of the sound of bombing"
• British nurse Paula Tobin, who is running a UK-funded field hospital near Rafah, says her patients are surviving on just one meal a day and “in the next week, we will not be able to feed them at all"
• Mai Elawawda, who works for Medical Aid for Palestinians, says “the future is utterly bleak.” “After more than 19 months of forced starvation, dehydration, and displacement, we do not know how much longer we can hold on,” she says
• Suha Shaath, a pharmacist from Khan Younis, speaks of the shortage of pain relief medicines, saying “we made a promise to stand with our patients until the last moment of our lives”
• Mohammed Abu Rjileh said his Gaza Youth charity is working “day by day” to provide meals for people and currently does not have the ingredients needed for tomorrow
• We also heard from our Gaza correspondent Rushdi Abualouf, who said reporting on the conflict has “broken me in ways I still struggle to express”