GAZA CITY, Palestine/ANKARA 

A Palestinian girl died Saturday at Al-Rantisi Hospital in Gaza City due to severe malnutrition and dehydration as Israel maintains a crippling blockade that has cut off food, water, and medical aid to the population for over two months.

A medical source told Anadolu that the child, Janan Saleh Al-Saqafi, passed away as a direct result of starvation and lack of clean water.

Multiple Palestinian officials and UN agencies have repeatedly warned about the catastrophic consequences of Israel’s ongoing closure of Gaza’s border crossings preventing the entry of food, medicine, fuel, and water since early March.

In a statement on Friday, the Government Media Office in Gaza stated that Israel is “systematically destroying food infrastructure by targeting bakeries, relief centers, soup kitchens, water wells, food warehouses, and farmland as part of a starvation policy against the Palestinian population.”

Since March 2, all major crossings into Gaza have remained shut to humanitarian supplies worsening an already dire humanitarian crisis, according to various governmental, human rights, and international reports.

More than 52,400 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza in a brutal Israeli onslaught since October 2023, most of them women and children.

The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants last November for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.