TEHRAN — Israel’s relentless military assault on Gaza continues to leave a trail of death, destruction, and starvation, as the international community remains largely passive in the face of what many now describe as a deliberate campaign of extermination.

On Monday alone, Israeli strikes killed dozens more Palestinians, according to medical sources. Just a day earlier, Israeli troops slaughtered more than 100 Palestinians across the besieged strip — including 92 unarmed civilians who were shot dead while desperately seeking food near the Zikim crossing in northern Gaza and at aid distribution points in Rafah and Khan Younis.

The humanitarian crisis has reached catastrophic levels under Israel’s suffocating siege, which has pushed Gaza to the edge of famine. With vital crossings sealed and aid severely restricted, Gaza’s 2.3 million residents face starvation in real time.

The UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) has sounded the alarm, revealing it is receiving “desperate messages of starvation” from inside Gaza — including from its own staff. In a post on X, the agency wrote: “Food prices have increased 40-fold. Meanwhile, just outside Gaza, stockpiled in warehouses UNRWA has enough food for the entire population for over three months.”

Calling the crisis “manmade,” UNRWA demanded urgent intervention: “The suffering in Gaza is manmade and must be stopped. Lift the siege and let aid in safely and at scale.”

The World Food Program echoed these warnings. Antoine Renard, WFP’s representative for Palestine, told Al Jazeera from occupied East Jerusalem (al-Quds): “You have a level of despair that people are ready to risk their lives just to reach any of the assistance actually coming into Gaza. Just to give you an idea, [the price of] 1kg of flour is currently $100.”

Renard added that many families are going days without food, surviving on meals every third day. He noted that only a “very limited” number of charity kitchens are still operating, with malnutrition soaring and fainting among civilians becoming increasingly common.

“[There’s a] soaring number of people facing malnutrition, and we can really see that the situation is really getting to levels that we’ve never seen ever before.”

Despite these appalling conditions, Israel continues its brutal military campaign unchecked. Channel 12 reported that Israeli Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir has proposed a new phase of ground operations, described by Israeli sources as “the plan for taking over Gaza.”

Since the start of its war on Gaza in October 2023, the regime of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — who is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes and crimes against humanity — has killed more than 59,000 Palestinians. Human rights experts and legal scholars accuse Israel of using starvation as a weapon of war in an effort to force Palestinians from their homeland — a strategy that many now openly label as genocide.

Earlier this month, Francesca Albanese, the UN Special Rapporteur for the occupied Palestinian territory, called for immediate international action to halt Israel’s ongoing “genocide” in Gaza.

Yet, Israel’s military aggression and starvation policies continue with impunity, bolstered by unwavering support from some Western powers — particularly the United States.