In an age saturated with digital media and instantaneous narratives, the truth often arrives late — if it arrives at all. The so-called “Gaza famine” is a case in point. In 2024, as the Israel–Hamas war continued, New Zealand’s media outlets (like many across the globe) reported that Gaza was on the brink of, or already experiencing, a full-blown famine. The claim was shocking, the imagery harrowing — and Israel was immediately blamed.
There was only one problem: the famine was never confirmed.
Yes, Gaza faces immense hardship. Yes, many have gone hungry. But the assertion that Israel engineered or permitted a famine (a claim repeated without qualification across the New Zealand media landscape) has not been substantiated by the very institutions responsible for defining such crises. The fact that so few outlets have revisited the original claims or acknowledged emerging counter-evidence reveals not only a journalistic failure but a deeper willingness to amplify the propaganda of a terrorist regime.
What Is — and Isn’t — a Famine?
“Famine” is not a rhetorical flourish. It’s a technical designation defined by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), a global partnership involving UN agencies, NGOs, and governments. To declare a famine, three thresholds must be met:
- At least 20% of the population must face extreme food shortages.
- Acute malnutrition must affect more than 30% of children.
- The death rate must exceed two people per 10,000 per day.
In March 2024, the IPC warned that northern Gaza was “at risk of imminent famine,” citing worsening food insecurity. This projection was widely reported as a confirmation — not a forecast based on limited and contested data.
What most outlets failed to mention was the nature of the data itself — much of it originating from Hamas-controlled institutions, such as the Gaza Ministry of Health and local NGOs operating under the group’s supervision. Hamas has a long and well-documented history of manipulating humanitarian statistics for political ends, especially during conflict.
The Reassessment: Famine Conditions Not Confirmed
In June 2024, the Famine Review Committee (FRC) — an independent expert panel that audits IPC assessments — issued a significant reassessment. It concluded that the available evidence from March was insufficient to confirm that famine conditions existed in northern Gaza. Among the issues flagged:
- Methodological flaws, including overreliance on unverified surveys.
- A lack of transparency in data sourcing.
- Failure to account for informal markets and commercial food availability.
- Ignoring Israel’s growing facilitation of aid entry.
The FRC found that key information necessary to determine famine (including the identity of data collectors, verification protocols, and hunger-related mortality rates) had not been disclosed.
A February 2025 report from UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI) reinforced these findings. It documented how food deliveries, market prices, and available nutrition data were inconsistent with famine conditions. The report further criticised the IPC for failing to disclose who conducted field surveys, how deaths were attributed to hunger, and what independent oversight existed.
This reassessment, though largely ignored by many media outlets, matters. It undermines one of the most emotionally charged accusations made against Israel during the war — and one used to support international legal efforts to accuse it of genocide.
What Aid Was Actually Entering Gaza?
Contrary to the media narrative, Israel — via the Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) — significantly increased humanitarian access to Gaza from late 2024 into 2025. According to COGAT:
- By February 2025, over 1,600 aid trucks per week were entering Gaza — matching or exceeding pre-war levels.
- Israel coordinated air drops, maritime deliveries via Ashdod, and land crossings at Kerem Shalom and Rafah.
- Satellite imagery showed substantial aid stockpiles at distribution centres.
Videos and photos circulating on Palestinian social media showed Ramadan feasts, bustling bakeries, open-air markets, and well-stocked groceries — even as some international media continued reporting starvation. These images, while not definitive, raise serious questions about the supposed ubiquity of famine. If a famine were indeed underway, why the mismatch between claims and what observers (including Palestinians themselves) were documenting?
New Zealand’s Media Failure
Despite all this, outlets such as RNZ, 1News, Newshub, NZ Herald and Stuff continued to report on “famine in Gaza” as if it were a confirmed fact. In doing so, they echoed the rhetoric of international outlets like The Guardian, BBC, CNN, and Al Jazeera — all of which often rely on Hamas-linked sources without sufficient scrutiny.
Too often, these reports omit critical context:
- That Gaza is governed by Hamas, a proscribed terrorist group that has systematically diverted aid.
- That Israel maintains a military and humanitarian coordination framework, monitored by international observers.
- That famine declarations have serious legal implications and must not be wielded loosely.
Worse still, no major New Zealand media outlet has issued a correction or editorial acknowledgment of the FRC’s reassessment. There have been no headline updates, no retractions, no reflection on the reliability of sources. Nor has there been recognition that Hamas has repeatedly weaponised civilian suffering to elicit international sympathy and deflect from its own culpability.
This is not just a lapse in reporting — it is a moral abdication.
Who Benefits from the Famine Narrative?
The myth of famine has inflicted real damage. It has fuelled legal claims of genocide. It has galvanised anti-Israel protests in New Zealand and abroad. It has emboldened organisations that mask antisemitism in humanitarian rhetoric.
Most insidiously, it has distracted from the true source of Gaza’s suffering: Hamas. A regime that hides in tunnels while civilians suffer above ground. That hoards and resells food. That obstructs aid delivery and civilian evacuation. That depends on the global media to carry its message.
By repeating Hamas’s narrative without question, New Zealand’s media have failed the public. They have reduced complex truths to caricatures, transformed a war against terrorism into an alleged genocide, and enabled a terrorist group’s disinformation campaign to go unchecked.
A Call for Accountability
It’s time for a reckoning.
New Zealand media must revisit their Gaza coverage. They must issue corrections where facts have changed. They must clearly identify Hamas-linked sources and stop treating the Gaza Ministry of Health as if it were a neutral civil body. Journalists must interrogate their own assumptions. Editors must review their sourcing protocols. And the public — especially Jewish and Israeli communities — must demand better.
A media environment that amplifies atrocity claims without verification, and that refuses to self-correct, becomes complicit in misinformation that polarises public opinion and emboldens extremism.
The Gaza famine was never confirmed. And it’s time we said so — clearly, credibly, and without apology.
