Itimad al-Kanu, a Palestinian mother struggling to feed her seven children, feels abandoned by everyone. Sometimes she feels that death is the best way to end her family’s suffering after a year of war that has turned Gaza into a desolate land plagued by hunger.

“Let them drop a nuclear bomb and be done with it. We don’t want this life we are living, we are slowly dying. Mercy! Look at these children,” says the mother of three boys and four girls, aged between 8 and 18.

Children in their hometown, Deir al-Balah, crowd into a humanitarian aid distribution center with empty containers in their hands, desperately waiting for food. Humanitarian workers distribute lentil soup from a large pot – but that is never enough to amuse their hunger and calm the panic.

“They are all united against us”

Kanu says her family is facing Israeli strikes, which have killed tens of thousands of people and leveled most of Gaza, on the one hand, and hunger on the other.

“No one is looking at us, no one is taking care of us. I ask Arab countries to support us, at least open the borders so that food and supplies can reach our children,” she said.

“They are all liars, they are all lying to the world. The United States is standing with Israel against us, they are all united against us.”

Yesterday, trucks carrying humanitarian aid were allowed to cross the Erez crossing in northern Gaza.

The US will decide this week whether Israel has made progress in improving the humanitarian situation in Gaza and how Washington will respond.

Displaced Gazans under threat of starvation – Israel uses hunger as a weapon

Food security experts from around the world have said there is a “strong possibility” that famine is an imminent danger in parts of northern Gaza as Israel conducts a military campaign against Hamas militants there.

In response to the famine warning, the head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees UNRWA, Philip Lazarini, accused Israel of using hunger as a weapon.

COGAT, the Israeli army agency that handles relations with the Palestinians, yesterday published a list of Israel’s humanitarian efforts over the past six months. It gave details of plans to support Gazans as winter approaches.

Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, Dani Dannon, told the UN Security Council last month that more than a million tons of aid had been delivered in the past year and accused Hamas of grabbing that aid. Hamas denies those accusations.

In addition to hunger, Gazans say there is no safe place to go after repeated displacements have left them living in tents until they have to move again to escape further strikes.

Some say their struggle is even worse than the “Nakba” or “Catastrophe” of 1948 when hundreds of thousands of Palestinians lost their homes in the war to create the state of Israel.

“The conditions were better than what we are facing now. Now, we have no security, and no place to go,” said Mohammed Abu Karaa, one of Gaza’s many displaced residents.