Image source, Getty Images

Furious outcry over the way Israel distributes aid to people in Gaza has continued today, as we heard more and more stories of Palestinians describing an unprecedented hunger.

The day began with David Lammy telling the BBC he was "sickened" by the scenes in Gaza, a day after the UK joined over two dozen countries calling for an end to the war. As the day progressed, the UN said that Israel had killed more Palestinians seeking food at distribution sites, bringing the total number killed since May to over 1,000.

Israel has disputed those death tolls, and both Israel and the US say the distribution system is necessary to stop Hamas from stealing aid.

Meanwhile, the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza reported that 33 people, including 12 children, had died of starvation and malnutrition in the past two days alone.

Several hospitals in Gaza may have to close in the next 48 hours due to fuel shortages, the ministry warned, as Israel demonstrates its intent on continuing its ground offensive in the central city of Deir al-Balah.

The city is a place where many civilians were sheltering and humanitarian organisations base their operations. Israel's chief of general staff said troops must be prepared for a "continued wide-scale and comprehensive campaign".

This is where we will end our live coverage for now, but you can find further reporting below:

• The latest: WHO condemns Israeli attacks on facilities in central Gaza
• Political reaction: Lammy "appalled and sickened" by civilian suffering in Gaza
• International outcry: UK and 27 other nations condemn Israel over "inhumane killing" of Gaza civilians seeking aid
• Watch: Israel challenged on strikes that kill "desperate starving children"
• Analysis: Israel's allies see evidence of war crimes in Gaza mounting up, writes Jeremy Bowen

As the conflict between Israel and Hamas grinds into its 21st month - with no ceasefire in sight - the Today Debate will be asking the question this evening: what can stop the war on Gaza?

The BBC's international correspondent Jeremy Bowen will join presenter Nick Robinson for the programme, which you can listen to live on BBC Radio 4 and BBC Sounds.

The show will also be streamed live on iPlayer and the BBC News website at 20:00 BST.

As we reported earlier today, the World Health Organization (WHO) has said its facilities came under attack during Israel's first major ground operation in Deir al-Balah.

The WHO's representative for the West Bank and Gaza says he is "furious" that Israeli forces have hit several of the NGO's facilities, and that it has left staff and their families exposed to "grave danger".

Dr Rik Peeperkorn says the Israeli military entered the WHO's premises - detaining two of their staff and two family members, with one staff member remaining in detention now.

A statement from the Israeli military is then put to Dr Peeperkorn, which says the IDF facilitated the safe evacuation of the organisation's personnel. The statement adds that troops detained individuals suspected of being involved in terrorism, who were treated in accordance with international law.

Responding to the statement, Dr Peeperkorn says: "There's an agreement with Israeli authorities and [the] IDF that UN premises, humanitarian premises, coordinates are shared, and that they remain to be protected.

"The WHO operational presence is compromised, it's crippling efforts to sustain an already collapsing health system and pushing survival further out of reach for more than two million people."

Satellite image shows burning aid warehouse in Deir al-Balahpublished at 17:16 British Summer Time 22 July

17:16 BST 22 July

Image source, Planet Labs PBC

As Israel continues its first ground offensive in Deir al-Balah since the start of the war with Hamas in 2023, BBC Verify has been looking into low resolution satellite imagery showing black smoke rising from a warehouse in the central Gaza city.

The satellite photo - captured by Planet Labs yesterday morning - also shows what appears to be new track marks that armoured vehicles may have made while entering the city.

A video published last month , externaland geolocated by BBC Verify showed armed men escorting World Health Organization (WHO) branded lorries containing "medicines and medical supplies" to the same warehouse.

BBC Verify is in touch with the WHO, who is yet to confirm the warehouse in the satellite picture belongs to it, but in a statement yesterday it said:

“WHO’s main warehouse located in Deir al-Balah is within the evacuation zone, and was damaged yesterday after an attack caused explosions and fire inside."

Read more on BBC Verify's live page.

Caroline Hawley
Diplomatic correspondent

A cancer nurse, 38-year-old Randa, has just sent me a WhatsApp message, which she calls a "cry for survival" from Gaza.

"I watch cancer patients - mostly women - dying one after another," she writes.

"Not because of the disease alone, but because they receive chemotherapy in bodies weakened by malnutrition.

"One of the most common things I hear at work is not 'I’m in pain', but: 'I’m hungry.'"

Most essential chemo drugs and pain relief are not available, she adds.

"We try everything we can, but we have so little to offer. We watch them slip away… and we carry that heartbreak with us every single day."

She continues: "Hunger is killing us faster than illness ever could. For the first time in my life, I am completely helpless. I cannot provide even a piece of bread for my children, nor the help my patients need."

She says she leaves her four children crying in their tent as she heads out to work at the Nasser hospital in southern Gaza.

"We, the medical teams, are collapsing from exhaustion and hunger. We stand on our feet for endless hours without even one meal. Many of us have fainted, but our duty doesn’t allow us to leave. We cannot turn our backs on patients, even when our own bodies are breaking down.

"This is my daily life. A mother with starving children. A nurse surrounded by dying women. A human being caught in a place that the world seems to have forgotten.

"Let the world know what is happening here - not as a news story, but as a cry for survival."

Rushdi Abualouf
Gaza correspondent, reporting from Istanbul

Residents in Gaza are describing the hunger crisis in the territory as the worst in living memory, with families forced to survive on tiny portions of lentils and salt water, while prices for basic staples have soared beyond the reach of even those receiving financial aid from abroad.

“We haven’t eaten anything except a bit of lentils in two days,” says Mohammad Mahmoud, a father of four. “We mix a little table salt into a glass of water and drink it, just to get some electrolytes.”

Even those who manage to receive cash transfers from relatives abroad, he says, find it impossible to use them. “The commission to convert money now exceeds 50%. What’s left can’t even buy a kilo of flour, which now costs $80 (around £60).”

The humanitarian crisis is being described by locals and medical workers as unlike anything Gaza has experienced in decades.

“I go to work hungry and leave my six children behind, also hungry,” says Osama Tawfiq, a veteran employee in the supply department at Gaza’s largest hospital, Al-Shifa.

“There is no food for the patients. Children are dying of hunger inside the hospital. I’ve worked here for 20 years, and never in my life have I seen someone die from starvation until now.”

Local hospitals and aid agencies warn that people are dying from malnutrition, particularly among children and the elderly, while food distribution efforts are frequently delayed, intercepted, or looted.

Mallory Moench
BBC News reporter

“We are still alive, but there is nothing to eat,” Gazan teenager Saba Nahed Alnajjar tells me in a WhatsApp message today.

“There is no food or medicine. We have become skeletons. There is no immunity. Gaza has become unliveable. I want to get out of this hell. I cannot bear it,” the 19-year-old says.

Saba tells me she now weighs 35 kilograms (77 pounds) and is “suffering from severe malnutrition”. Food prices are very high and there is no money to buy it, and water is polluted, she says.

“I can't hold on any longer,” she says.

Her family was displaced from Khan Younis and has been living in the al-Mawasi coastal area in a tent since earlier this year.

Saba was going to study medicine in Algeria, but when the war started she could not leave Gaza and lost her scholarship. She is now looking to see if any American, British or French university will sponsor her studies and evacuation.

She wants to study, live a normal life and survive, she says, and doesn't want war or money to be an obstacle to her future.

“I'm afraid I'll die without living my future and my life,” she says.

Emir Nader
Reporting from Jerusalem

We’ve been hearing from families at a medical centre in Gaza City caring for children with severe malnutrition. The hospital had been the only site in the north of Gaza for children suffering from severe malnutrition.

On Sunday they were forced to open a second centre.

There, a local freelancer working with the BBC met Noura Hijazi, a 29-year-old who stays in a tent in the west of Gaza City with her two children.

Hijazi's 20-month old child, Aisha, appeared fatigued and in distress with signs of rash on her skin.

"I have a son who suffers from muscle spasms," she explains, adding that she has "no food to give to him".

"I also have this little daughter. She has been motionless for four days. She stopped moving and talking. She went down from 10kg to 8kg; she lost 2kg in four days.

"She asks for food but I can’t find any."

Hijazi’s partner was killed in the war, and she now says she has no source of income.

"You wait all day long in the hope you get something small to eat – but you get nothing. You drink a glass of water with salt in it in order to get through the day."

"We ask them to stop the war, to consider these children who have done nothing wrong."

Image source, Reuters

On the aid situation in Gaza:

• The UN says more than 1,000 people have been killed by Israel's military while trying to get food in Gaza since the US- and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) distribution system began on 27 May
• A former Israeli government spokesperson was challenged earlier on such killings by the BBC's Nick Robinson - listen to their exchange
• Meanwhile, the Hamas-run health ministry has published figures on the number of deaths in Gaza caused by malnutrition - with 33 people, including 12 children, known to have died in the past 48 hours
• Earlier, UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy told the BBC he was "sickened" by the scenes in Gaza while the UN warned that the "last lifelines keeping people alive [in Gaza] are collapsing"

In Deir al-Balah:

• Almost two days after Israel's military launched its first ground assault on the central Gazan city, Israeli officials have defended the use of gunfire there - saying troops identified shots being fired at them and "responded toward the area from which the shooting originated"

Also from the Israel Defense Forces (IDF):

• Eyal Zamir, chief of the general staff in the Israeli military, said his troops must "be prepared for a continued wide-scale and comprehensive campaign"

Elsewhere in Gaza:

• The Hamas-run health ministry has warned that remaining hospitals in Gaza may have to close within 48 hours due to fuel shortages, blaming Israel for holding up deliveries

The search for food in Gaza is constant as Israel pushes ahead with new military operationpublished at 15:26 British Summer Time 22 July

15:26 BST 22 July

Paul Adams
BBC World Affairs

Image source, Reuters

Israel’s military is now attacking areas of the Gaza Strip that were relatively untouched before and where huge numbers of displaced people are sheltering.

In the nearby Gaza City, the search for food is constant.

"We haven't eaten in five days," Mohammed Jundia tells the Reuters news agency.

"Today, it was a huge struggle until people took pity on us and gave us a bag of flour."

The foreign ministers of twenty-five mostly European countries have issued a plea for Israel to comply with international law and stop drip feeding Gaza with aid.

Unrwa has highlighted the story of eight-month-old Ahlam, whose short life has been punctuated by constant displacement and, now, severe acute malnutrition.

A similar situation for six-month-old Iman. Her family says there’s no food at home and they’ve been forced to move six times during the war.

For these children, the UN is only able to offer basic help. Its staff are also on the verge of collapse.

There is talk, once again, of a ceasefire.

But Israel is pushing ahead with a new military operation and doesn’t seem inclined to listen to anguished calls coming from abroad.

"Our life right now is literally defined by survival," a communications officer for Oxfam tells the BBC from Deir al-Balah.

Ghada Al-Haddad says her team has seen "dozens of people" dying not from gunfire, but from starvation in the Gaza Strip.

"It's hard to continue with this life right now," Al-Haddad says.

Asked about how people are approaching the aid distribution sites, she says: "People realise these distribution sites are death traps, yet they go there out of despair - they go there because they do not have anything to feed their children.

"It's heart breaking to see a mother listening to her child cry because he or she wanted food and she cannot give them food.

"This is not aid, aid doesn't kill."

For context: There have been almost daily reports of Palestinians being killed while seeking aid at distribution sites established in late May. The Israeli military recognised earlier this month there had been some civilians who had been harmed, and said it was working to minimise "possible friction" between the population and military forces. The Israeli military and the GHF have disputed the death tolls reported.

Bernd Debusmann Jr
Reporting from the White House

Image source, EPA

I've just arrived at the White House, where in a little under two hours' time, President Trump is scheduled to meet with the president of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos Jr.

As is customary in such visits, the meeting will include an "Oval Spray", during which reporters are free to ask questions - and today, many are likely to focus on Gaza.

It has been several days since we last heard from Trump on the conflict.

Yesterday, however, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt was peppered with questions on the administration's views on how aid is distributed, and the almost daily reports of Palestinians being killed while seeking aid at distribution sites established in late May.

In response, she said that Trump "wants to see aid distributed in a peaceful manner where lives are being lost".

"He hated seeing pictures of starvation of women and children desperately needing that aid," she added.

She did not answer when pressed on whether he had spoken to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address the deaths, although she repeatedly noted that a negotiated end to the war remains a "top priority" for the administration.

More than 1,000 people have been killed by Israel's military while trying to get food in Gaza since the US- and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) distribution system began on 27 May, the UN says.

The UN Human Rights Office (OHCHR) says that as of 21 July it has recorded 1,054 people killed in Gaza while trying to get food, of which 766 were killed "in the vicinity" of GHF sites, and 288 "near UN and other humanitarian organisations’ aid convoys".

"Our data is based on information from multiple reliable sources on the ground, including medical teams, humanitarian and human rights organisations. It is still being verified in line with our strict methodology," it says.

Both Israel and the GHF have disputed death tolls, and both Israel and the US say the system is necessary to stop Hamas from stealing aid.

The UN refuses to co-operate with the GHF, describing its set-up as unethical.

A journalist who was escorted by the Israeli military to view an aid distribution site in Gaza has told the BBC that he saw "chaotic" scenes unfolding from his vantage point, which was just a few hundred metres away.

For context: Israel does not allow the BBC and other international media into Gaza to report freely, except on a few highly controlled visits accompanied by soldiers.

Anshel Pfeffer, Israel Correspondent at The Economist, tells the BBC News channel that, in his brief time in Gaza, he saw crowds "surging towards the distribution centre" near Khan Younis.

He describes US security contractors attempting to keep order - firing what he was told were "non-lethal rounds" into the air and using tear gas.

"At some point they'd lose control of the crowds and retreat, so the boxes of supplies were grabbed up by whoever was in the front of the queue until another shipment of boxes arrives a few hours later," Pfeffer adds.

Watch his interview below:

Gaza's Hamas-run health ministry has just warned hospitals in the region may cease functioning within 48 hours due to fuel shortages.

In a statement, the ministry says it has had to suspend services at six health clinics and medical centres because of the lack of fuel.

It blames the situation on Israel, saying it is deliberately blocking the World Health Organization from supplying fuel to hospitals in Gaza.

There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military.

Caroline Hawley
Diplomatic correspondent

Image source, Suha Shaath

I’ve been hearing today from a pharmacist, mother and grandmother, Suha Shaath, who works in Nasser hospital in Khan Younis. She says Gazans are dying "a slow death" from hunger.

She’s been displaced several times since her home was destroyed earlier in the war and now lives in a tent with her family.

"Last night I couldn’t sleep because of the sound of a child crying in the neighbouring tent – crying from hunger. His parents couldn’t find anything to feed him or calm him down," she says

Her own last meal was canned peas and a portion of rice. She says she’s lost 10kg since the war began, and constantly feels weak and fatigued.

"What troubles me most at the moment is the lack of flour in the markets and, if found, the price per kilo exceeds $30 (£22)."

She says she’s better off than most people in Gaza where hunger "tortures fathers with helplessness, and children with the shock that their parents cannot save them".

Image source, Getty Images

Some comments now from Eyal Zamir, chief of the general staff in the Israeli military, who says his troops must "be prepared for a continued wide-scale and comprehensive campaign".

Giving a situational assessment, Zamir says the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) is "managing a complex and challenging reality that requires multi-arena operations" in Gaza.

"The war in the Gaza Strip is one of the most complex the IDF has ever known," he goes on, stressing that Israel is "paying a heavy price in combat".

After Israel mounted an aerial attack on neighbouring Syria last week, Zamir says his forces "will continue to weaken and prevent Syria and Hezbollah from achieving strategic capabilities".

• For more on that last point, head to our explainer: Who are the Druze and why is Israel attacking Syria?

The Hamas-run health ministry has published more figures on the number of deaths caused by malnutrition.

A ministry spokesman says 33 people, including 12 children, have died in the past 48 hours.

The total number of deaths due to malnutrition stands at 101, of which 80 are children, since the beginning of the war in 2023, they add.

Earlier today, the BBC's Nick Robinson spoke to former Israeli government spokesperson Eylon Levy about the country facing mounting international condemnation.

More than 20 countries, including the UK, released a joint statement yesterday criticising Israel for "unacceptable" conduct in Gaza over reports of Palestinians being killed while queuing for food at designated points.

Levy responded: "This is a war against Hamas and not against the people of Gaza."

Robinson pushed back: "What, children queueing to get food at depots set up by Israel, having closed the international ones?"

Listen to more of their exchange below:

The journalists' association of Agence France Presse - an international news agency based in France - says the last reporters in Gaza will die without immediate intervention, warning its colleagues are at risk of starvation.

In a letter released yesterday, and written in French, the journalists' association says the news agency has been working with freelancers in the territory and that "we refuse to see them die".

It describes freelance reporters living in "absolute destitution" and regularly risking their lives to report on what is happening in the territory, amid a shortage of food, water and sanitation.

AFP's management issued a statement shortly afterwards, saying for months it has "watched helplessly" as freelancers' conditions "deteriorated dramatically", adding: "Their situation is now untenable, despite their exemplary courage."

"This is why AFP, which managed to evacuate its eight staff members and their families from Gaza between January and April 2024, is taking the same steps for its freelance staff, despite the extreme difficulty of leaving a territory subject to a strict blockade," it says, calling on the Israeli authorities to allow them to evacuate.

• For context: Israel does not allow international journalists, including from the BBC, to enter Gaza to report freely.