Abdul N Quraishi - Abs / Shutterstock.com
Landmark joint press release by 4 leading UN agencies--the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), UNICEF, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP), and the World Health Organization (WHO)--confirming famine in Gaza Governorate, with more than half a million people trapped in famine marked by widespread starvation, destitution, and preventable deaths. Since the last Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) analysis in May 2025, the number of children expected to be at severe risk of death from malnutrition by end of June 2026 had tripled from 14,100 to 43,400. Similarly, for pregnant and breastfeeding women the number tripled from 17,000 to 55,000. 1 in 5 babies is born prematurely or underweight. The agencies issued a call for an immediate ceasefire and unhindered humanitarian access. An essential landmark document for researchers working on famine and food security in Gaza, representing the first formal 4-agency confirmation of famine and providing the authoritative pre-ceasefire baseline for assessing whether the October 2025 ceasefire succeeded in addressing the food security crisis. This source is valuable for researchers, policymakers, and advocates working on famine and starvation as a weapon of war, and is the essential primary document marking the formal famine confirmation in Gaza.
