Situation is dire' - BBC returns to Gaza baby left hungry by Israeli blockade.
There is no excitement as the camera passes—just hollow gazes from children too weary to look up. What could startle a child who lives among the dead, the dying, and those simply waiting to die? Hunger has worn them thin.
They queue—sometimes for meagre rations, sometimes for nothing at all. They barely register my colleague and his camera, filming for the BBC. He captures their hunger, their deaths, and the gentle shrouding of bodies—or fragments of them—wrapped in white cloths, names inscribed if known.
For 19 months of war, and now under a renewed Israeli offensive, this local cameraman—unnamed here for his safety—has borne witness to the anguished cries of survivors in hospital courtyards. He keeps a respectful physical distance, but mentally and emotionally, he is enmeshed in their suffering. He is one of them—trapped in the same claustrophobic nightmare.
This morning, he sets out to find Siwar Ashour, a five-month-old girl whose frail frame and faint cry at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis deeply moved him during a recent shoot. He later wrote to me: something inside him had broken.
Siwar weighed just over 2 kilograms (4 lbs 6 oz)—a five-month-old should weigh more than 6 kg. She has since been discharged, reportedly at home now. That news leads my colleague through streets of rubble, toward makeshift shelters of canvas and corrugated metal.
He searches under perilous conditions. Just days ago, I messaged him to ask how he was coping. His reply: “I am not okay. The Israeli army has announced the evacuation of most of Khan Younis… We don’t know what to do—there’s no safe place to go. Al-Mawasi is overcrowded with displaced people. We’re lost, and we have no idea what the right decision is anymore.”
Eventually, he finds a one-room shack, its entrance a curtain of grey and black floral fabric. Inside: three mattresses, a partial chest of drawers, and a mirror that reflects sunlight onto the floor where Siwar lies, held between her mother, Najwa, and grandmother, Reem.
Siwar is quiet now, protected in the arms of her family. She cannot tolerate regular formula due to a severe allergy. But the war and Israel’s blockade have made the specialized formula nearly impossible to find.
Najwa, 23, says her daughter stabilized in the hospital and was discharged with a single can of formula. Now, back home, Siwar’s weight is slipping again. “The doctors said she’s better,” Najwa says, “but I think she’s still too thin. They found her only one can of milk, and it’s almost finished.”
Flies buzz around Siwar’s face. “The situation is dire,” Najwa adds. “The insects swarm her—I have to cover her with a scarf so they don’t touch her.”
Since her birth last November, Siwar has known only the sounds of war—artillery, rockets, bombs, and the constant whir of Israeli drones. “She understands them,” Najwa says. “The noise of tanks and planes frightens her. If she’s asleep, she wakes up crying.”
Doctors in Gaza report that many mothers can no longer breastfeed due to malnutrition. The most urgent needs remain food and clean water.
Najwa was malnourished when Siwar was born and still struggles, along with Reem, to find anything to eat. “We can’t afford formula or diapers,” she says. “The prices are too high, and the borders are closed.”
On 22 May, the Israeli military body COGAT claimed there was no food shortage in Gaza, stating that significant quantities of baby food and flour had been brought in. COGAT also accused Hamas of stealing aid, while Israel maintains the war will continue until Hamas is destroyed and Israeli hostages are freed. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says 20 hostages from the 7 October 2023 attacks are believed alive, with as many as 30 dead.
But aid agencies, the UN, and many governments—including the UK—dispute Israel’s claims. US President Donald Trump has acknowledged that people in Gaza are starving.
UN Secretary General António Guterres described the aid entering Gaza as “a teaspoon” and said Palestinians are enduring “what may be the cruellest phase of this cruel conflict,” with critically limited fuel, shelter, cooking gas, and water purification supplies.
According to the UN, 80% of Gaza is now either designated an Israeli military zone or has been ordered to evacuate.
Denials, condemnations, and fleeting moments of global concern have come and gone throughout the war. One thing remains constant: the suffering of Gaza’s 2.1 million people—people like Najwa and Siwar.
“One doesn’t think about the future or the past,” Najwa says.
There is only the present—and the struggle to survive it.
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