JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
International pressure is growing for Israel to end the war in Gaza and allow more humanitarian aid into the territory. U.N.-backed experts said this week that, quote, "worst-case scenario" famine was playing out there. On Sunday, Israel began to let in more aid, but aid groups say it's nowhere near enough, and for many starving Palestinians, trying to reach that food can be deadly. NPR's Emily Feng, with producer Anas Baba in Gaza City, have the story.
EMILY FENG, BYLINE: This week, 19-year-old Maher Al-Hattab plucked up his nerve...
MAHER AL-HATTAB: (Speaking Arabic).
FENG: ...And walked to just outside one of the collection sites for the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, or GHF. That's the U.S.- and Israeli-backed food distribution system that's replaced the U.N. aid system in Gaza. Israel had just announced a daily pause in fighting so more food could get in, and Hattab was hungry.
AL-HATTAB: (Speaking Arabic).
FENG: For more than three hours, he lay in the sand as Israeli troops fired at hungry crowds waiting for the food to arrive. He says he saw people hit on their shoulders, legs and hands.
AL-HATTAB: (Speaking Arabic).
FENG: So when the trucks arrived with less food than expected, Hattab says people waiting fought tooth and nail over it. Some took out knives and stabbed other people. Hattab survived, and for his troubles he came away with some flour, pasta and cooking oil - food for his family for two days.
JAN EGELAND: This is not what we asked for when we said time is running out for the children of Gaza.
FENG: This is Jan Egeland, head of the humanitarian organization the Norwegian Refugee Council. He says Israel has let in more aid, but not enough. It is still blocking his organization's trucks from entering Gaza. And because people must walk in the summer heat to retrieve the food off trucks or from air drops...
EGELAND: Just drops where the strongest is able to take it.
FENG: Israeli authorities have repeatedly said Hamas has been looting aid trucks. Egeland and eyewitnesses on the ground in Gaza tell NPR that systematic looting is done by private gangs.
EGELAND: Some belong to some families that is cooperating with Israel, and they have said that we will also fight Hamas, so therefore, they are tolerated. It's a system made in hell.
FENG: Egeland is a longtime diplomat and aid worker with decades of experience in war zones and famines. By comparison, Gaza, he says, is an easy place to distribute food.
EGELAND: It's a flat stretch of land. It's a crowded area. It's the deliberate starvation done by Israel that is - makes this apart from any other of the crisis worldwide.
FENG: Tess Ingram is a UNICEF spokesperson. She argues the looting is preventable.
TESS INGRAM: That is a result of engineered scarcity. We have been advocating for increased volumes of aid to enter Gaza with consistency because we're sure that if that happens, that desperation will drop.
FENG: Ingram says in June, only a third of UNICEF's requests for missions in Gaza were approved by Israel's military. The other U.N. agencies and aid organizations all say they're still facing delays and denials to pick up and deliver food in Gaza. The Israeli military says around 100 to 200 trucks a day of aid are going into Gaza, but that's a fraction of the 500 trucks a day the U.N. says is needed. The result is...
ANAS BABA, BYLINE: You are going to go to a - military zones, that the tank is next to you, and there is gangs all over next to you with knives - with big knives.
FENG: That's NPR's producer Anas Baba in Gaza. He has been trying to track every food truck coming in.
BABA: The trucks are entering while the gangs are looting the trucks. And it's still at the market you can't find a baby formula for your children. You can't find diapers. You can't find food. You can't find flour. You can't find anything in order to feed yourself.
FENG: Basel Hasouna is trying to feed his five kids.
BASEL HASOUNA: (Speaking Arabic).
FENG: He says, at first, when he heard Israel would let in more aid, he was optimistic. But he says people who truly need that aid have not gotten it. And as hungry as he and his children are, Hasuna says he refuses to go to GHF sites or to approach the aid trucks coming in because of the dozens of people who have been killed this week alone doing so.
HASOUNA: (Speaking Arabic).
FENG: Hasouna says he has principles. He does not want his son to be humiliated trying to get food. He says they would rather die of hunger at home. Their lives are worth more than a sack of flour.
Emily Feng with Anas Baba, NPR News. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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