Young people’s nutrition and food insecurity during the war on Gaza: longitudinal evidence from GAGE

Since the Hamas attack of 7 October 2023, Israel has carried out actions that amount to genocide. It has systematically destroyed the Gaza Strip, killed tens of thousands of people, and deliberately deprived Gaza’s population of life-saving humanitarian aid (Amnesty International, 2024; HRW, 2024; Asem, 2025; B’Tselem, 2025; Forensic Architecture, 2025; UN, 2025). The blocking of aid resulted in a famine between 22 August 2025 and 19 December 2025. By August 2025, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) estimated that the complete population of Gaza was experiencing ‘high levels of acute food insecurity’, with almost 1 in 3 people (32%) in danger of reaching catastrophic levels (phase 5) in September 2025 (IPC, 2025). Although the ceasefire in place since 10 October 2025 has brought some relief to young people in Gaza, humanitarian aid continues to be obstructed, and hundreds of Palestinians have been killed because of Israeli hostilities (OHCHR, 2026).

Suggested citation 

Vintges, J., E., Abu Hamad, B., Diab, R., Leung, S. and Jones, N. (2026) ‘Young people’s nutrition and food insecurity during the war on Gaza: longitudinal evidence from GAGE’. Policy brief. London: Gender and Adolescence: Global Evidence (https://gage.odi.org/young-people-s-nutrition-and-food-insecurity-during-the-war-on-gaza-longitudinal-evidence-from-gage/)