The United Nations humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher told the BBC on Tuesday that 14,000 Gazan babies could die in the next 48 hours unless aid reaches them, a statement that was seemingly retracted soon after by other UN officials.
"There are five trucks just sitting on the other side of the border right now, they've not reached the communities they need to reach," Fletcher told the BBC. "This is baby food, baby nutrition. There's 14,000 babies that will die in the next 48 hours unless we can reach them."
When asked by the BBC how he came to this "extraordinary figure," Fletcher explained "we've got strong teams on the ground, they are at the medical centers, the schools, trying to assess needs."
However, the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) later told the BBC that: "We are pointing to the imperative of getting supplies in to save an estimated 14,000 babies suffering from severe acute malnutrition in Gaza, as the IPC partnership has warned about. We need to get the supplies in as soon as possible, ideally within the next 48 hours."
It referenced a report by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) which stated 14,100 severe cases of acute malnutrition may occur among children aged six to 59 months between April 2025 and March 2026. The report's timeframe is one year, not two days.
Tom Fletcher, United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator (OCHA) attends a press conference in Geneva, Switzerland, (credit: REUTERS/DENIS BALIBOUSE)
As many commented on social media, 14,000 is around one quarter of the total alleged Gaza death toll for the entire 18 month war.
In a news conference later on Tuesday, a separate UNOCHA spokesman chose to not repeat the figure but said that if babies who are "in urgent life-saving need of those supplements" do not get them they will be "in mortal danger."
In the same conversation with the BBC, Fletcher also criticized Israel's proposed humanitarian aid strategy, which involves moving Gazans to southern Gaza to a Hamas-free area to receive aid.
Israel allowed aid into Gaza
Israel decided to begin to allow humanitarian aid back into the Gaza Strip on May 18, almost two and a half months after the state decided to prevent aid from entering Gaza when the first phase of a ceasefire deal ended on March 1.
Fletcher called the new strategy a "dodgy modality" and said the previous method of getting aid into Gaza "works perfectly well."
"The international community is very clear with us that this is the only way to do it," he added. "To go with the other modality would be to support the objectives of the military offensive."
When asked whether he would be handing over aid to the new mechanism, he said "We've got to get the aid in ourselves."
Fletcher was also questioned over his recent speech about the need to prevent genocide in Gaza, with the BBC asking if he "had any pushback over his – I assume well-informed -choice to use that word?"
"I weighed with great thought and care what I should say," Fletcher replied. "I felt we needed to jolt the international community."
"We know what's going on, we are on the ground every day. I want to save as many of these 14,000 babies as we can in the next 48 hours."
Fletcher said in a statement on Monday that the new aid "is a drop in the ocean of what is urgently needed, and significantly more aid must be allowed into Gaza."
Later on Tuesday, the UN confirmed that it had received permission from Israel for about 100 more aid trucks to enter Gaza. IDF officials inspected 93 United Nations aid trucks, confirming that the humanitarian aid included flour for bakeries, food for babies, medical equipment, and pharmaceutical drugs.
