In a hospital room at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, Gaza, an 11-month-old Palestinian girl, Seela Barbakh, lies on her back, her fragile body a stark illustration of the devastating impact of malnutrition in the Gaza Strip.

Seela's mother, Najah Barbakh, cradles her daughter's head in her hands, supporting it as she struggles to do so herself, weighing around 4 kilograms, significantly below the average 9 kilograms for her age.

Dr. Ahmad Al-Farra, head of the paediatrics and maternity department at Nasser Hospital who examined Seela, described her condition as a severe case of acute malnutrition.

According to him the hospital has seen a surge in malnutrition cases in recent weeks, with many patients arriving in critical condition.

Palestinians died overnight from starvation, the Gaza health ministry said, bringing the total number of people who have starved to death to 111, most of them in recent weeks as a wave of hunger crashes on the Palestinian enclave.

In a statement on Wednesday (July 23), 111 organizations, including Mercy Corps, the Norwegian Refugee Council and Refugees International, said mass starvation was spreading even as tons of food, clean water and medical supplies sit untouched just outside Gaza, where aid groups are blocked from accessing them.

The World Health Organization said on Wednesday it was seeing a deadly surge in malnutrition in Gaza that has led to the deaths of 21 children under five so far in 2025.

Israel, which cut off all supplies to Gaza from the start of March and reopened it with new restrictions in May, says it is committed to allowing in aid but must control it to prevent it from being diverted by militants. It says it has let enough food into Gaza during the war and blames Hamas for the suffering of Gaza's 2.2 million people.

Israel has also accused the United Nations of failing to act in a timely fashion, saying 700 truckloads of aid are idling inside Gaza. "It is time for them to pick it up and stop blaming Israel for the bottlenecks which are occurring," Israeli government spokesman David Mercer said on Wednesday.

The United Nations and aid groups trying to deliver food to Gaza say Israel, which controls everything that comes in and out, is choking delivery, and Israeli troops have shot hundreds of Palestinians dead close to aid collection points since May.

Israeli military statistics showed on Tuesday (July 22) that an average of 146 trucks of aid per day had entered Gaza over the course of the war. The United States has said a minimum of 600 trucks per day are needed to feed Gaza's population.

Baby formula in particular is in critically short supply, according to aid groups, doctors and residents.

The war between Israel and Hamas has been raging for nearly two years since Hamas killed some 1,200 Israelis and took 251 hostages from southern Israel in the deadliest attack in Israel's history.

Israel has since killed nearly 60,000 Palestinians in Gaza, decimated Hamas as a military force, reduced most of the territory to ruins and forced nearly the entire population to flee their homes multiple times.

DESCRIPCIÓN DE IMÁGENES

KHAN YOUNIS, GAZA (JULY 23, 2025) (REUTERS - Access all)

1. PAEDIATRIC PATIENT ROOM AT NASSER HOSPITAL / WOMAN SEATED ON CHAIR INSIDE ROOM

2. VARIOUS OF MOTHER OF MALNOURISHED CHILD SEELA BARBAKH, NAJAH BARBAKH, REMOVING HER DAUGHTER'S CLOTHES AS SEELA LAYS ON BED

3. VARIOUS OF NAJAH SITTING ON HOSPITAL BED NEXT TO SEELA WHO IS DRINKING FROM BABY FEEDING BOTTLE / NAJAH HOLDING SEELA'S HEAD

4. (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic) MOTHER OF MALNOURISHED CHILD SEELA BARBAKH, NAJAH BARBAKH, SAYING:

"She stayed in the intensive care for four days, we left and came back to the hospital. Every week I would go out one day and come back for ten. She doesn't have food. She needs proteins, she needs meat, she needs something to provide her body with energy so that the girl could live. We lost many cases in the room (paediatric room) due to lack of food and lack of milk."

5. VARIOUS OF NAJAH SITTING ON HOSPITAL BED NEXT TO SEELA / SEELA DRINKING FROM BABY FEEDING BOTTLE

6. (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic) MOTHER OF MALNOURISHED CHILD SEELA BARBAKH, NAJAH BARBAKH, SAYING:

"Since I delivered her, she has been small and she doesn't grow up. Her condition gets worse in the hospital, and every time I go home, I find her becoming more and more weak. She has no nerves. Her nerves are weak and she doesn't sit (properly). Babies like her, in her age of 11 months, should sit up straight. She should be 11 or 10 kilograms minimum. My daughter can't sit straight, or play with her siblings, she stays lying on her back, and that's all."

7. NAJAH SITTING ON HOSPITAL BED, HOLDING SEELA'S HEAD AS SEELA DRINKS FROM BABY BOTTLE

8. SEELA LAYING ON HER BACK ON BED

9. (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic) MOTHER OF MALNOURISHED CHILD SEELA BARBAKH, NAJAH BARBAKH, SAYING:

"The closure of crossings on us has ruined our world. We can't travel, go out, treat, or get her food. At least we want food for her. I want food to feed her so she can grow up and live her life like the rest of the children of Gaza. The children of Gaza are dying of hunger. The children of Gaza have run out of food and they are dying."

10. VARIOUS OF HEAD OF THE PAEDIATRICS AND MATERNITY DEPARTMENT AT NASSER HOSPITAL, AHMAD AL-FARRA, EXAMINING SEELA

11. (SOUNDBITE) (English) HEAD OF THE PAEDIATRICS AND MATERNITY DEPARTMENT AT NASSER HOSPITAL, AHMAD AL-FARRA, SAYING:

"Seela Barbakh, she's 11 months old. Her weight should be nearly 9 or 10 kilograms, but unfortunately her actual weight is just near 4 kilo(grams) or below 4 kilograms. Seela is one of the examples, extreme examples and bad examples for severe malnutrition because she's not complaining from anything. She was healthy, she was complaining from nothing, neither cardiological manifestations nor pulmonary or inborn errors of metabolism, she was a normal baby."

12. VARIOUS OF AL-FARRA EXAMINING SEELA

13. (SOUNDBITE) (English) HEAD OF THE PAEDIATRICS AND MATERNITY DEPARTMENT AT NASSER HOSPITAL, AHMAD AL-FARRA, SAYING:

"The problem that her mother was starved and she was complaining from severe malnutrition and she was unable to giver her breastfeeding. And also the mother didn't find any formula, or milk to give for Seela. So Seelaa as we can see, Seela now is complaining from severe, severe acute malnutrition, she's lost the muscles and fat. She has just skin over the bone. She has a distended abdomen. She has manifestations of hypovitaminosis, vitamin D, and other vitamins. She's also anaemic. She has iron deficiency anaemia."

14. AL-FARRA EXAMINING SEELA

15. (SOUNDBITE) (English) HEAD OF THE PAEDIATRICS AND MATERNITY DEPARTMENT AT NASSER HOSPITAL, AHMAD AL-FARRA, SAYING:

"As we can see that the cases of malnutrition increased in huge numbers in the last week, and a lot of cases came to the hospital, unfortunately, after they died. We actually, since nearly two months ago, we were alarming and getting notifications about this point. But unfortunately, we catch (reached) this point and we are in a critical situation about malnutrition in Gaza Strip."

16. PAEDIATRIC PATIENT ROOM

17. WOMAN WALKING HOLDING BABY AT NASSER HOSPITAL

18. EXTERIOR OF NASSER HOSPITAL BUILDING / PEOPLE WALKING IN FRONT OF BUILDING

GAZA CITY, GAZA (JULY 23, 2025) (REUTERS - Access all)

19. VARIOUS OF PALESTINIANS HOLDING BOWLS AND POTS AS THEY GATHER AT A SOUP KITCHEN TO RECEIVE FOOD / PEOPLE POURING FOOD INTO POTS

20. (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic) DISPLACED PALESTINIAN, ILHAM ABU AL-ATA, 50 SAYING:

"Look at us with mercy and bring us food so we can eat something, anything for us to eat... Let the crossings open, (find us) any solution. Enough starvation, enough, enough."

21. VARIOUS OF CROWDS GATHERING IN FRONT OF SOUP KITCHEN TO RECEIVE FOOD, HOLDING BOWLS AND POTS / PEOPLE POURING FOOD INTO POTS

22. (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic) DISPLACED PALESTINIAN, UMM (MOTHER OF) SAMIR, SAYING:

"We are unable to buy flour, we can't afford to buy flour, nor do we have anything to eat or drink for our children. Our situation is really difficult. There is nothing, there is nothing. If we do not bring some (food) from the soup kitchen to feed them some lentils every day, there is no food."

23. CROWDS GATHERING IN FRONT OF SOUP KITCHEN TO RECEIVE FOOD, HOLDING BOWLS AND POTS