Trapped in a silent nightmare

Children will soon begin starving to death every day in Gaza if they do not receive immediate support.

This is the horror of famine, a rare catastrophic combination of extreme hunger, death, and pain that is on the brink of destroying people who have already suffered so much.

Thousands of families who have spent the past year being ravaged by hunger, bombs, and bullets are now preparing to watch their children die in front of them from starvation.

For many in Gaza, it is already too late. Children have died from severe malnutrition, caught deadly diseases, or had their limbs blown off in explosions. At least 14,000 children have died.

But your support today can help save others from the terrible, painful death caused by malnutrition.

UNICEF supporters have enabled us to provide life-saving peanut paste to children, and cash transfers to families so they can buy the little amounts of commercial food available in markets.

In Lebanon too, where a ceasefire has recently been agreed, UNICEF is on the ground helping children badly injured, traumatised and driven to hunger by the war that killed over 240 children. More than 1.2 million people were forced from their home during the conflict, and over 100,000 families might not have anywhere to return to. Hospitals and water facilities have also been badly damaged, increasing the risk from deadly diseases like cholera.

Close to 2 million hungry, frightened children across Gaza and Lebanon are living in these desperate conditions with urgent need of food, safe water, and shelter.

With the threat of famine looming, they need your help now. There is no time to lose. 

A malnourished baby in Gaza, where 90% of the population are facing extreme levels of acute food shortages.

Time is running out

“We can’t find food that meets the basic needs of the children – it is raining on us, and the place is filled with debris and diseases.”

Every morning, Mona’s hungry children ask her for bread, and every morning she tells them there is none. She lives in the north of Gaza, where food is so scarce thousands of people are on the brink of starvation.

Not only are her children facing the deadly threat of hunger, but her son can no longer walk and her daughter has caught hepatitis from the terrible conditions. Mona is trying to raise her children the best she can, but she is alone – her husband has died.

“What sin did this girl commit to suffer from hepatitis?” Mona says, breaking down in tears, adding that her children “cry and just want a piece of bread”.

Mona’s children are among thousands in Gaza who are weak, in pain, and, in the worst cases, dying from malnutrition. Children across the whole of Gaza are at risk of famine. 

Deadly hunger 

Four-year-old Sila is one of these children. A bomb took her leg and family and now starvation could take her life.

Her mother, father and three sisters were killed in an airstrike. She was so badly injured in the attack, the doctors had to amputate her leg. Now, in the silence between the bombs, she struggles to survive, alone and hungry, living in a cold, abandoned school.

Sila is just one of millions of children in Gaza who have been forced to flee their homes and now live with the daily threat of death from malnutrition and disease. With little food or clean water, they need help now. Time is running out.

UNICEF will not stop despite the deadly attacks

Children in Gaza are on the brink of a catastrophic famine – and with little infrastructure left, they will struggle to survive. In Gaza, 67% of water and sanitation infrastructure and 82% of health facilities have been destroyed or damaged. In Lebanon too, the water supply for over 390,000 people has been restricted after 33 water facilities were badly damaged.

Thousands of children are now completely reliant on life-saving supplies being sent by people like you.

The threats to delivering this aid are deadly and the challenges immense.

Yet despite this, live-saving food, safe water and medical aid is reaching children and helping them survive the horror thanks to generous support from people like you. This includes:

• Treating at least 21,000 children suffering from acute malnutrition in Gaza.
• Installing 5,000 latrines and providing access to safe water for more than 1 million children at risk from deadly diseases.
• Providing over 24 million litres of trucked water and more than 18,000 hygiene kits to people in Lebanon forced from their homes. 
• Distributing more than 10,000 high–energy biscuits and micronutrient supplements to hungry children in Lebanon. 

Despite these efforts, millions more people need ongoing, urgent help. Right now, children in Gaza face severe injury, suffering and death, while in Lebanon homeless children are cold and hungry as a harsh winter approaches. They need your help now. 

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