A 17-year-old Palestinian boy has died of starvation in Gaza, according to hospital officials and family members, as aid restrictions and famine continue to claim lives across the besieged enclave.

Atef Abu Khater, once a local sports champion, died on Saturday at al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City after suffering from acute malnutrition. His body weight had dropped from 70kg to just 25kg the approximate weight of a nine-year-old child.

“We hear from his family members and others who knew him that he used to be a local sports champion. He ended up losing a lot of weight, becoming acutely malnourished, and ultimately dying,” said a correspondent.

According to journalist Wisam Shabat, who shared a video of the teenager’s final moments on Instagram, Abu Khater arrived at the hospital in a critical condition, suffering from severe complications linked to starvation and a lack of medical care.

In the verified footage, grieving relatives are seen gathered around his emaciated body laid out in an open white body bag. His ribs and cheekbones are visibly protruding, and one family member is seen running a finger along his skeletal ribcage.

The director of al-Shifa Hospital said that Abu Khater is one of at least seven Palestinians who died of starvation in the past 24 hours across Gaza. Since Israel’s war on Gaza began in October 2023, at least 169 people, including 93 children, have died from starvation or malnutrition, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.

The United Nations and multiple humanitarian organizations have attributed the growing famine in Gaza to Israeli restrictions on aid deliveries, which, despite partial easing, remain heavily obstructed.

Philippe Lazzarini, head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), stated bluntly on Saturday, “The manmade famine in Gaza has been largely shaped by the deliberate attempts to replace UN aid systems with a contentious, US and Israeli-backed group called the GHF.”

He accused Israel of “actively preventing the UN and other humanitarian groups from delivering lifesaving aid to Palestinians,” describing it as,

“A deliberate measure to collectively pressure and punish Palestinians for living in Gaza.”

“No time to waste anymore, a political decision must be made to unconditionally open the crossings,” Lazzarini said in a post on X.

According to UN reports, over 1,300 Palestinians have been killed while trying to access food at distribution points run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) since May, when the group started operating.

On Saturday, as reported from Deir el-Balah in central Gaza, where they were with families searching for food and water under intense conditions.

“Dozens of people, including infants, are dying slowly due to forced starvation by Israel,” she reported.

“One of them is Misk al-Madhoun, a malnourished five-year-old whose parents have no way of feeding her. They say they are seeing her dying slowly every single day.”

Khoudary added that many mothers are resorting to giving babies only water due to the total lack of milk or formula, while others walk long distances daily in the intense heat in search of any open kitchen or food distribution site.

“Even if they go to the GHF sites,” she said, “they risk being killed, wounded or coming home empty-handed.”

Earlier this week, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), a global authority on hunger tracking, warned that Gaza is already experiencing famine conditions.

“Latest data indicates that famine thresholds have been reached for food consumption in most of the Gaza Strip and for acute malnutrition in Gaza City,” the IPC report stated.

“Amid relentless conflict, mass displacement, severely restricted humanitarian access, and the collapse of essential services, including healthcare, the crisis has reached an alarming and deadly turning point.”

Despite international criticism, Israel has said it is scaling up aid deliveries, including via airdrops. But aid groups call the approach inadequate and dangerous, reiterating their demands for full humanitarian access via open land crossings.

As more families like that of Atef Abu Khater bury their loved ones, the human cost of the crisis continues to mount one body, one family, and one life at a time. (AriseNews TV, excluding headline)

•The body of Atef Abu Khater, 17, who died from malnutrition, is seen at a hospital in Gaza City on August 2, 2025 [Khames Alrefi/Anadolu]