Most of the buildings have been destroyed, hospitals have been forced to close and food is scarce. The reality in the Gaza Strip is catastrophic.

Around 90% of the more than 2 million inhabitants have now fled within the territory, and some have already been forced to move several times.

With the latest evacuation order for the city of Deir al-Balah, 87.8% of Gaza is now under evacuation orders or within the Israeli military's restricted military zones, according to the UN emergency aid office OCHA. The population is now crammed into 12% of the enclave's territory, it said on Tuesday.

International pressure on Israel is growing, with 28 states, including France, the UK and many other Western nations, calling for an end to the war.

How many deaths have there been since October 7, 2023?

According to OCHA, as of July 15, 2025, 58,380 Palestinians have died since Israel started its offensive in Gaza in October 2023, including many women and children. OCHA, which is responsible for coordinating humanitarian affairs, cites data from the Health Ministry in Gaza.

The ministry is run by Hamas, which Israel, the US, Germany, the EU and other organizations designate as a terrorist organization. The United Nations and Israeli intelligence officials deem the numbers reported by Gaza's Health Ministry as reliable. Given Israel's ongoing military operation in the small enclave, these numbers cannot be independently verified.

Several third-party studies have indicated the true death toll could be nearly twice as high. According to a study by an international research team, more than 80,000 Palestinians are said to have been killed up to January 2025. The scientific journal Nature reported on the study, which was conducted under the direction of Michael Spagat from Royal Holloway College, University of London, in late June.

The scientists worked closely with the research organization The Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research, which is funded by the European Union, among others. Staff surveyed 2,000 families about deaths within their household and then extrapolated the figures.

A study published in The Lancet in January also found that deaths in Gaza were being underreported. For this study, obituaries on social networks were compared with the Health Ministry's lists.

The war in Gaza was triggered by Hamas-led terrorist attacks on Israel on October 7, 2023. Around 1,200 people were killed, and Hamas abducted 251 people as hostages to Gaza. According to official Israeli information, 50 people kidnapped from Israel are still being held in Gaza, at least 20 of whom are believed to be alive. According to the Times of Israel on Tuesday, 895 Israeli army personnel have also died in the war.

How many people are starving in Gaza?

After almost two years of war, the lack of basic goods entering Gaza has had dramatic consequences. Many Palestinians are suffering from hunger, often lacking most basic necessities.

According to Welthungerhilfe, a German nonprofit humanitarian assistance organization, the 25 remaining bakeries closed at the beginning of April. Most of the 177 community kitchens have also run out of supplies, Welthungerhilfe told DW.

Almost one in three people eat nothing for days on end, the UN World Food Program (WFP) told DW. For most of them, aid deliveries are the only way to get any food at all.

According to the latest report in May from the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, a international authority on the severity of hunger crises, which many aid organizations also refer to, Gaza's entire population is now affected by acute food insecurity (IPC level 3). According to the definition, this means that the choice of food is limited, and people have to work extremely hard to get the calories they need.

According to the IPC, 470,000 people in Gaza are at risk of catastrophic hunger (IPC level 5). This corresponds to acute danger to life due to hunger; there is an extreme lack of calories per person per day.

The IPC system is an internationally recognized instrument for measuring and classifying hunger and food security. Five levels are defined, ranging from phase one, "minimal," to "stressed," "crisis," "emergency" and phase five, "Famine."

It is also forecast that more than 71,000 children and an estimated 17,000 mothers will require urgent treatment for acute malnutrition in the coming months. According to UNICEF, the UN's children's humanitarian agency, children are considered to be acutely malnourished if their weight is less than 80% of the appropriate weight for their age.

Teams from the aid organization Doctors Without Borders also noted a sharp rise in cases of "acute malnutrition" in mid-July. According to the nongovernmental organization, hundreds of women and children with severe and moderate malnutrition are currently being treated in health centers, and the numbers are clearly on the rise.

According to Gaza's Health Ministry, people are dying of hunger every day, most of them children. On Tuesday, 15 people died of starvation. This cannot be verified independently.

Where can the sick in Gaza be treated?

Getting medical care has also become increasingly difficult in Gaza. According to an assessment by the aid organization Doctors Without Borders in July, no hospital is fully functional. Facilities that are still in operation are completely overburdened. According to the NGO, the conditions for treatment are catastrophic: most hospitals no longer have electricity or running water.

The World Health Organization reported that 18 out of 36 hospitals were still partially operational at the end of June. Almost 40% of the points of contact for basic medical care — doctors' surgeries, outpatient clinics and aid offered by NGOs — were still operational. The field hospitals are also limited; only two are fully intact.

How much aid is still arriving in Gaza?

Israel blocked humanitarian supplies to Gaza for 11 weeks in the spring, aggravating the situation even further. All supplies are becoming increasingly scarce: food, water, medicine and fuel, which is necessary for the operation of hospitals and public community kitchens.

The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which is backed by Israel and the US, has been distributing food at a few distribution centers since the end of May. However, there have been repeated reports of fatal incidents near the GHF distribution points, including in recent days. For a long time, aid organizations have been pressing to be allowed to resume their provision of relief supplies to the region.

In an interview with DW, the World Food Program explained that since the end of the aid blockade on May 21, an average of 20 to 30 WFP trucks with food have reached Gaza Strip. The amount delivered is only a small fraction of what the more than 2 million people in the Gaza Strip need to survive. During the ceasefire, 600 to 700 trucks crossed the border every day.

This article was originally written in German.