• Survey shows rate of children suffering acute malnutrition nearly triples
• Four journalists among 20 Palestinians killed in fresh Israeli strikes

CAIRO: A US- and Israeli-backed organisation distributing aid in Gaza said on Thursday it was reopening two distribution sites a day after shutting them following a series of deadly shootings close to its operations.

The US-based Gaza Humanitarian Foundation said only two sites in southern Gaza’s Rafah area would operate on Thursday, after all sites were closed the day before for maintenance. The GHF had opened three sites earlier in the week, and one of Thursdays sites was in a new location, it said.

The GHF, which has been fiercely criticised by humanitarian organisations, including the United Nations for alleged lack of neutrality, began distributing aid last week. The UN has warned that most of Gaza’s 2.3 million population is at risk of famine after an 11-week Israeli blockade of the enclave.

According to data collected by humanitarian groups and released by the UN on Thursday, the rate of young children suffering from acute malnutrition in Gaza has nearly tripled since a ceasefire earlier this year when aid flowed more freely.

Around 5.8 per cent out of nearly 50,000 children under five who were screened in the second half of May were diagnosed with acute malnutrition, an analysis by a group of UN and other aid agencies known as the nutrition cluster showed.

This was up from 4.7pc in early May and nearly three times the rate in February.

Meanwhile, Israel announced it had recovered the bodies of two dual nationality Israeli-American prisoners from Gaza. Gadi Hagi and his wife Judy Weinstein-Hagi were killed and taken to Gaza after Hamas’ October 7, 2023 attack that triggered the war. Fifty-six prisoners remain in captivity, with fewer than half believed to be alive.

The Israeli military has intensified operations in Gaza since breaking a fragile ceasefire with Hamas in March, taking more territory with the government pushing to wipe out the Islamist militant group.

At least 20 Palestinians were killed in Israeli strikes across Gaza on Thursday, including four journalists in a hospital in the enclave’s north, local health authorities said.

The Hamas-run government media office says that 225 journalists in Gaza have been killed since the war began.

Published in Dawn, June 6th, 2025