Webinar | Starvation as a Weapon: International Legal Responsibilities and the Diplomatic Convoy to Confront Deliberate Famine in Gaza

Main Information:

• Date: Thursday, 29 May 2025
• Time: 18:00 – 19:30 CET || 19:00 – 20:30 Jerusalem
• Location: Online via Zoom and Live on YouTube.
• Language: The webinar will be conducted in English. Simultaneous translation into Arabic will be available.
• Registration is required: You can register here.

Background:

On 12 May 2025, more than 800 Palestinian and international humanitarian and human rights organisations issued an urgent and unified call to the international community to end the manufactured mass starvation in Gaza. They called for the immediate organization and deployment of a Diplomatic Humanitarian Convoy through the Rafah Crossing, urging states to join by sending official diplomatic missions – at the highest possible level – to accompany the aid trucks already waiting at the crossing and to enter Gaza alongside them.

This call comes in response to Israel’s complete blockade of all humanitarian aid and life-saving assistance to Gaza which lasted almost three months, a policy widely recognized as genocidal under the Genocide Convention. The World Food Program (WFP) and UNICEF warned that this blockade has intensified hunger and malnutrition especially among children. According to the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) snapshot issued on 12 May, “470,000 people in Gaza are facing catastrophic hunger (IPC Phase 5), and the entire population is experiencing acute food insecurity.” The report projected that 71,000 children and more than 17,000 mothers will need urgent treatment for acute malnutrition in the coming months. The risk of famine is “increasingly likely” with deaths expected to rise sharply if current conditions persist.

UNRWA and the World Food Programme have exhausted their reserves, while Israel moves to dismantle the existing UN-run aid distribution system. The new Israeli plan – which has been widely rejected by the UN agencies, EU officials and states – attempts to create several “aid hubs exclusively in the south of the Strip,” and would permit only 60 aid trucks per day into Gaza to be distributed only to Palestinians “vetted” by the Israeli military.

Despite the resumption of limited aid into Gaza through the Kerem Shalom crossing on 18 May, a significantly higher number must be allowed into the Strip to meet the urgent needs of a population facing an imminent risk of famine. The level of humanitarian aid that has been allowed is “completely inadequate” and was described by Tom Fletcher, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, as “a drop in the ocean” of the urgent needs of over 2 million people facing acute hunger. In an interview on the BBC on 20 May, Fletcher warned that thousands of babies are at risk of dying of hunger if essential supplies are not allowed to enter. According to OCHA, the UN and its partners have 9,000 truckloads of vital supplies -over half of which contain food assistance- ready to enter Gaza, but they remain blocked by Israel.

This is being done in open defiance of the core principles of international law, as reiterated in binding legal orders, including the ICJ’s provisional measures in South Africa v. Israel – orders that remain ignored and unfulfilled over a year later. The ICJ issued provisional measures on three occasions in 2024, all of which included measures to ensure the provision of and access to basic services and humanitarian assistance. In its order of 28 March 2024, the ICJ voted unanimously that Israel should “take all necessary and effective measures to ensure, without delay, in full cooperation with the United Nations, the unhindered provision at scale by all concerned of urgently needed basic services and humanitarian assistance, including food, water, electricity, fuel, shelter, clothing, hygiene and sanitation requirements, as well as medical supplies and medical care to Palestinians throughout Gaza, including by increasing the capacity and number of land crossing points and maintaining them open for as long as necessary.” The Court reaffirmed this measure along with others in its following order on 24 May 2024.

The deliberate starvation of a civilian population is regarded as a method of warfare and an international war crime based on the Rome Statute (Article 8(2)(b)) and is a crime articulated by the ICC Prosecutor in the arrest warrants issued by the ICC against the Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and the former Defence Minister Gallant in November 2024. International humanitarian law as codified in the fourth Geneva Convention obligates the Israeli occupation authorities to treat the population under its effective control humanely including through the provision and facilitation of access to humanitarian aid. The deliberate starvation of the Palestinian population, done with the intent to destroy the group, amounts to and forms part of what most human rights organizations have referred to as genocide.

In the current circumstances where Gaza is under near-complete siege, the international community is under the obligation to act in line with its duties to prevent the genocide and facilitate access to humanitarian relief for millions of civilians under siege. The State of Palestine issued an official declaration of the Strip as a famine zone and similarly called for urgent international intervention, including under Article 99 of the UN Charter.

On 29 April 2025, UN Human Rights Chief Volker Türk warned of the total collapse of life-saving support, stating that “Third States have clear obligations under international law to ensure that such conduct stops immediately, and they must act accordingly.”

The Palestinian civil society call, backed by the international civil society, remains critical in confronting the inhuman and illegal long standing siege, and the ongoing use of starvation as a weapon of war.

In light of this, Law for Palestine in partnership with Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Al-Haq, is organizing a panel discussion to shed light on the imminent famine in Gaza and to mobilize support around available tools to the international community including the proposed Diplomatic Humanitarian Convoy to end the starvation of civilians and the deteriorating humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

Speakers: Legal Responsibilities Diplomatic Convoy Famine Gaza

• Lynn Boylan, Member of the European Parliament. Chair, Delegation for Relations with Palestine
• Michael Fakhri, UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food
• Ralph Wilde, International Law expert – University College London
• Adnan Abu Hasna, Spokesperson, UNRWA
• Amjad Shawa, Director, Palestinian Non-Governmental Organizations Network (PNGO) – Gaza
• Dr. Marwan Al-Hams, Director of Field Hospitals, Gaza
• Marc Botenga, Member of the European Parliament – Committee on Foreign Affairs

Moderator:

• Anisha Patel, Governing Council Member, Law for Palestine

To participate in this discussion, you need to register, click here

* The event will also be broadcast live on YouTube.