Israel’s foreign minister has accused Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese of telling “a lie” in accusing Israel of breaching international law in withholding aid from Palestinian civilians in Gaza.
The criticism came as a global hunger monitor issued an alert warning that famine is “playing out” in the Gaza Strip.
On Sunday, Mr Albanese levelled his strongest criticism of the Netanyahu government and the Israeli military, saying the scenes of starving children were “indefensible”.
Speaking in Jerusalem today, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar hit back at the prime minister and rejected the accusation..
“This is a lie, because we are not withholding any aid,” he told the ABC.
“It’s not only that it’s not true, but the opposite is the truth.”
PM says Israel’s denial of starvation in Gaza ‘beyond comprehension’
Mr Sa’ar echoed the rhetoric of other members of the Israeli government, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, that starvation was not gripping Gaza.
The comments are in stark contrast to the scenes coming out of the strip, and warnings from humanitarian agencies and the United Nations of a crisis across the war-ravaged territory.
The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) issued an alert this evening warning that the “worst-case scenario of famine is currently playing out in the Gaza Strip”.
“Mounting evidence shows that widespread starvation, malnutrition, and disease are driving a rise in hunger-related deaths,”
it said.
The IPC alert does not formally classify Gaza as being in famine. Such a classification can only be made through an analysis, which the IPC said it would now conduct “without delay”.
The IPC is a global initiative that partners with 21 aid groups, international organisations, and UN agencies, and assesses the extent of hunger suffered by a population.
‘Immediate action’ needed, famine report says
War has raged in Gaza between Israel and Palestinian militants Hamas for the past 22 months.
Facing global condemnation over the humanitarian crisis, Israel said on Sunday it would halt military operations for 10 hours a day in parts of the Palestinian enclave and allow new aid corridors.
Displaced Palestinians who have not received humanitarian aid gather as they survive on leftover food in Gaza. (Reuters: Dawoud Abu Alkas)
At the media event in Jerusalem, Mr Sa’ar insisted that there were no restrictions on aid entering the strip, even as Israel controls all of the borders heading into Gaza and imposed a total humanitarian blockade in March.
Those restrictions were partially eased a few weeks ago, and have been further relaxed since the weekend — but tight controls remain in place.
“There were more than 200 trucks that entered yesterday,” Mr Sa’ar said.
“Inside Gaza, waiting to be distributed, we have almost 600 trucks in both the crossings: Kerem Shalom and Zikim.
“And, if we are speaking about the last two months, more than 5,000 trucks entered to Gaza Strip, and anyone who wants to do that can do that.”
Mr Sa’ar also pointed to airdrops of aid, which began on Sunday.
“There is no route that we are not using,” he said.
How much food will airdrops deliver to Gaza?
For an area to be classified as in famine, at least 20 per cent of people must be suffering extreme food shortages, with one in three children acutely malnourished and two people out of every 10,000 dying daily from starvation or malnutrition and disease.
“Immediate action must be taken to end the hostilities and allow unimpeded, large-scale, life-saving humanitarian response. This is the only path to stopping further deaths and catastrophic human suffering,” the IPC alert said.
The latest data indicated that famine thresholds had been reached for food consumption in most of the war-torn Palestinian enclave — where some 2.1 million people remain — and for acute malnutrition in Gaza City, the alert said.
“Formal famine declarations always lag reality,” David Miliband, head of the International Rescue Committee aid group, said in a statement ahead of the IPC alert.
“By the time that famine was declared in Somalia in 2011, 250,000 people — half of them children under 5 — had already died of hunger,” he said.
“By the time famine is declared, it will already be too late.”
Starvation, malnutrition ‘rapidly accelerating’
The IPC has classified areas as being in famine four times: Somalia in 2011, South Sudan in 2017 and 2020, and Sudan in 2024. The IPC says it does not declare famine, but instead provides an analysis to allow governments and others to do so.
The IPC’s independent Famine Review Committee — which vets and verifies IPC findings that warn of or identify a famine — endorsed the Gaza alert on Tuesday.
The last IPC analysis on Gaza, issued on May 12, forecast that the entire population would likely experience high levels of acute food insecurity by the end of September, with 469,500 people projected to likely hit “catastrophic” levels.
“Many of the risk factors identified in that report have continued to deteriorate,” the Famine Review Committee said in the alert on Tuesday.
“Although the extreme lack of humanitarian access hinders comprehensive data collection, it is clear from available evidence that starvation, malnutrition, and mortality are rapidly accelerating.”
Israel controls all access to Gaza. After an 11-week blockade, limited UN-led aid operations resumed on May 19 and a week later, the obscure new US-based Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) — backed by Israel and the United States — began distributing food aid.
The rival aid efforts have sparked a war of words — pitting Israel, the US and the GHF against the UN, international aid groups and dozens of governments from around the world.
Israel and the US accuse Hamas of stealing aid — which the militants deny — and the UN of failing to prevent it. The UN says it has not seen evidence of mass aid diversion in Gaza by Hamas.
An aerial view shows damaged buildings in Gaza. (Reuters: Jehad Shelbak)
The IPC alert said 88 per cent of Gaza is under evacuation orders or within militarised areas.
“People’s access to food across Gaza is now alarmingly erratic and extremely perilous,” it said.
The IPC and the Famine Review Committee were both critical of the GHF efforts in the alert issued on Tuesday.
The IPC said most of the GHF “food items are not ready-to-eat and require water and fuel to cook, which are largely unavailable”.
The Famine Review Committee said: “Our analysis of the food packages supplied by the GHF shows that their distribution plan would lead to mass starvation.”
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The GHF says it has been able to transport aid into Gaza without any being stolen by Hamas and that it has so far distributed more than 96 million meals.
The IPC alert said an estimated minimum of 62,000 tonnes of staple food is required every month to cover the basic food needs of the Gaza population.
But it said only 19,900 tonnes of food entered Gaza in May and 37,800 tonnes in June.
The war in Gaza was triggered on October 7, 2023, when Hamas killed 1,200 people in southern Israel and took some 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies. Since then, Israel’s military campaign has killed nearly 60,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health authorities.
ABC/Reuters