UN says starvation imminent in Gaza, no let-up in Israeli assault

UN aid deliveries to Gaza were suspended on Friday due to shortages of fuel and a communications shut down, deepening the misery of thousands of hungry and homeless Palestinians as Israeli troops battled Hamas militants in the enclave.

The United Nations' World Food Programme (WFP) said civilians faced the "immediate possibility of starvation" due to the lack of food supplies.

International officials say a humanitarian crisis for the 2.3 million residents of Gaza is entering a new, more dire phase as war enters its seventh week.

Israel has vowed to annihilate the Hamas militant group that controls Gaza, since its fighters killed 1,200 people and dragged away 240 hostages on a deadly rampage on Oct. 7.

Since then, Israel has bombed much of Gaza to rubble, ordered the depopulation of the entire northern half of the enclave and made around two-thirds of Gazans homeless.

Gaza health authorities deemed reliable by the United Nations say more than 11,500 people are confirmed dead, 40% of them children, with many others trapped under rubble. They have not been able to update that toll for several days because of a lack of communications.

At Gaza's biggest hospital Al Shifa, focus of international alarm this week as a primary target of Israel's ground assault, Israel said its forces had found a vehicle with a large number of weapons, and an underground structure it called a Hamas tunnel shaft, after two days searching the premises.

The army released a video it said showed a tunnel entrance in an outdoor area of the hospital, littered with concrete and wood rubble and sand. It appeared the area had been excavated.