WOMEN AND GIRLS ARE EXCLUDED FROM EXISTING FOOD DISTRIBUTION SYSTEMS Humanitarian food assistance is the lifeline of Gaza’s population. Even before 2023, over 80 percent of people in Gaza were aid dependent.28 Now, after nearly two years of warfare and blockades, along with the overall collapse of livelihoods and markets, virtually all households are reliant on inconsistent, insufficient, and increasingly militarized aid.29 Research findings reveal that women and girls face particular obstacles in obtaining food and other humanitarian aid, further compounding their gendered risks of hunger and starvation. Crowds of men and women gather at soup kitchens in search of a meal. Credit: SOH Aid blockade and limited operations Since the conflict’s escalation, Israeli authorities have imposed a near-total blockade on Gaza, severely limiting humanitarian shipments of food, medicine, and fuel. In February 2024, more than half of humanitarian aid to northern Gaza was blocked, and on March 2, 2025, Israel ordered a full shutdown of aid access, with no aid trucks allowed to enter.30 Even when some convoys were permitted, the quantities were vastly insufficient. By May 2025, only about 5,600 metric tons of wheat flour entered Gaza over several weeks, while 8,000 to 10,000 metric tons per week were needed to sustain the population.31 Limitations on aid are felt especially in northern Gaza, where, as early as April 2024, people were surviving on as little as 245 calories a day, less than 12 percent of the minimum daily requirement for survival.32 This chronic undersupply also means humanitarian agencies have been forced to cut rations or suspend programs. The World Food Programme’s (WFP) operations were stretched to the brink; hot meal programs that fed 1 million people a day were reduced by 75 percent due to lack of supplies.33 Such scarcity affects everyone, but women suffer the most when aid is delayed or diminished. As one UN expert notes: “When crossings tighten, there is simply nothing to distribute, gender targeting becomes meaningless under starvation.” An INGO gender expert added: “Cash assistance (for women) is pointless when shelves are empty, and movement is blocked - women can’t convert assistance into food.” Women’s testimonies confirmed: “When the bombs came and the blockade tightened, food and water vanished. Flour was nowhere to be found, and I often went days without being able to bake a single piece of bread.” Both key informants and women described the compounding effects of limited aid and hunger. A frontline clinician noted treating “dozens of fainting women each week who had skipped two or three days of food while trying to queue,” and a woman recounted, “I fainted three times before I reached the front. I went home with nothing.” 12