Key Messages

• As of August, the ongoing delivery of humanitarian food and nutrition assistance is most likely preventing a Famine (IPC Phase 5) in Gaza, based on the convergence of the latest round of food consumption and acute malnutrition data collected in July/August with other available evidence. However, hunger and malnourishment remain dire, and hunger-related mortality is likely still occurring. Assistance is only partially mitigating the severity of acute food insecurity, resulting in Emergency! (IPC Phase 4!) outcomes across both the north and the south. Pockets of the population still face Catastrophe (IPC Phase 5). 
• Emergency! (IPC Phase 4!) outcomes, with pockets of households in Catastrophe (IPC Phase 5), are expected to persist across Gaza from September to December. Palestinians will continue to endure large to extreme food consumption deficits, malnourishment, and hunger-related mortality until government decision-makers take urgent and more meaningful action to ensure safe, consistent humanitarian access that facilitates both an increase in the quantity of aid and effective targeting and distribution of aid to 1.5-2.0 million people in need.
• FEWS NET’s decision to remove the “Famine possible” designation and instead classify Emergency! (IPC Phase 4!) outcomes is based on the increasing body of evidence that while acute food insecurity remains unacceptably severe across Gaza, the Famine (IPC Phase 5) thresholds are not currently being passed in either the north or the south. This should not diminish the urgency required for humanitarian response, as the scale of human suffering remains appalling, and the risk of Famine (IPC Phase 5) remains credible. A Famine (IPC Phase 5) would likely develop if anticipated food assistance delivery does not materialize, even though this scenario is not deemed the most likely scenario. 
• To avert the risk of Famine (IPC Phase 5) in Gaza, a substantial and sustained scale-up of humanitarian food assistance must occur in the south, and further scale-up of food assistance should also occur in the north. Large-scale assistance must be coupled with efforts to ensure all populations can access and utilize available food. Nutrition services must also continue to be substantially scaled up to not only mitigate the risk of death from severe malnourishment, but reduce and prevent acute malnutrition, especially among children.

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