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UNRWA Situation Report #171 on the Humanitarian Crisis in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. All information updated for 8 - 14 May 2025

UNRWA

16 May 2025

Highlights

• On 13 May, in an interview to the BBC, UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini stated that humanitarian aid including food is being used as a weapon of war, which could be qualified as a war crime by the ICJ. He added that "there is absolutely no doubt that we are talking about massive atrocities" unfolding in the Gaza Strip, that "could end up to genocide".
• Since the collapse of the ceasefire in Gaza on the night between 17 and 18 March 2025, intense Israeli Forces activities escalated, resulting in tens of thousands of civilians killed and injured, further damage and destruction to civilian infrastructure, and new waves of forced displacement.
• Humanitarian aid and supplies have not entered the Gaza Strip for over ten weeks now (since 2 March 2025), when the Israeli authorities imposed a siege. As a result, basic humanitarian supplies, including food, fuel, medical aid and vaccines for children, are rapidly running out; UNRWA flour and food parcels have run out and over one third of essential medical supplies are already out of stock. This is having a devastating impact on the population, particularly on vulnerable groups including children, women and the elderly.
• On 12 May, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) Acute Food Insecurity and Acute Malnutrition Special Snapshot concerning the period between April - September 2025 highlighted that the entire population of the Gaza Strip continues facing a critical risk of Famine. For the projection period, from 11 May to 30 September 2025, the whole Gaza Strip is classified with Crisis-level food insecurity (IPC Phase 3 or above), including over a million people - or 54 per cent of the population - in the Emergency phase (IPC Phase 4), and nearly 470,000 people - or 22 per cent of the population - facing catastrophic levels of acute food insecurity (IPC Phase 5).
• Briefing the UN Security Council on 13 May, the Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, Tom Fletcher, stated that "Israel is deliberately and unashamedly imposing inhumane conditions on civilians in the Occupied Palestinian Territory", and asked "for those killed and those whose voices are silenced: what more evidence do you need now? Will you act - decisively - to prevent genocide and to ensure respect for international humanitarian law?"