Gaza no longer in famine but hunger levels remain critical, UN says

The famine in Gaza has ended as a result of increased humanitarian aid deliveries into the territory, the UN said on Friday, though it warned that levels of hunger and the humanitarian situation remained critical.Almost one in eight people in Gaza still faced food shortages, the UN said, adding that persistent hunger had been made worse by winter flooding and the colder weather. Most people in Gaza live in tents or other substandard accommodation as Israel destroyed much of the housing and civilian infrastructure during its two-year war.Israel has partly eased restrictions on the entry of aid since an October ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, but delivery was still limited and inconsistent, the UN said.“No areas are classified in famine,” said the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) initiative, used by the UN to monitor food crises. The IPC first declared a famine in parts of Gaza in August after Israeli restrictions of food aid into the territory led to mass starvation, with at least 450 people starving to death, according to the Gaza ministry of health.The monitor said that despite the end of the famine classification, the situation in Gaza still remained dire, with “the entire Gaza Strip classified in emergency”. According to the IPC’s five-phase classification system, the emergency stage is just a step below famine and occurs when households have “very high acute malnutrition and excess mortality” due to lack of food.Before the ceasefire, Israel maintained a severe blockade on the entry of aid into Gaza, described as “systematic obstruction by Israel” by the UN under-secretary general for humanitarian affairs, Tom Fletcher, in August.After the US-mediated ceasefire took effect in October, Israel began to allow more aid from the UN and its partners to enter.“Following the ceasefire … the latest IPC analysis indicates notable improvements in food security and nutrition compared to the August 2025 analysis, which detected famine,” the IPC said.Aid workers have said that the deal remains fragile, however, with Israel carrying out near-daily strikes in the territory and both sides trading accusations of ceasefire violations.About 1.6 million people were expected to face “crisis” levels of hunger in the next four months, the IPC said, warning that if the ceasefire broke down, the strip could slip back into famine.Israel has vehemently denied the accusations that there is famine in Gaza and that it is restricting the entry of aid. Israel’s foreign ministry spokesperson, Oren Marmorstein, said in a post on X on Friday that in the face of “overwhelming and unequivocal evidence, even the IPC had to admit that there is no famine in Gaza”.Cogat, the Israeli body in charge of humanitarian affairs in Gaza, said the IPC report “portrays a distorted, biased, and unfounded picture of the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip”.The humanitarian community and the UN have widely acknowledged famine in Gaza, and the IPC is considered the global authority on food crises.Oxfam said hunger in Gaza remained at an “appalling” level and accused Israel of blocking humanitarian groups from bringing aid into the territory. “Oxfam alone has $2.5m worth of aid including 4,000 food parcels, sitting in warehouses just across the border. Israeli authorities refuse it all,” Nicolas Vercken, the campaigns and advocacy director at Oxfam France, said in a statement.Hundreds of thousands of people are still enduring torrential rains and the cold in frayed tents. Pictures of flooded encampments at the start of winter have circulated on social media. The threat of disease outbreaks remains high as hygiene conditions are subpar in the crowded tent settlements.On Wednesday, a 29-day-old baby died of hypothermia, according to Gaza’s ministry of health. “Children are losing their lives because they lack the most basic items for survival,” said Bilal Abu Saada, the nursing team supervisor at Nasser hospital, which received the baby before it died.The ceasefire remains fragile, with negotiators still unable to bridge the differences necessary to move to the second phase of the deal – meant to lead to a permanent peace.The US special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, is due to meet senior Qatari, Egyptian and Turkish officials in Miami on Friday to discuss how to move to the second part of the ceasefire deal, Israeli media reported.Under the second phase, Israel is supposed to withdraw from the 53% of Gaza it still controls, while a transitional authority will replace Hamas as the governing power, and an international stabilisation force is to be deployed in the territory.The Qatari prime minister, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim al-Thani, warned on Thursday that delays in moving to the second phase of the deal, as well as ceasefire violations, “endanger the entire process”.