Aid worker tells of horrors in Gaza where 'people risked bullets for a can of beans'

DESPERATE POPULATION ON THE BRINK OF FAMINE

- By JOEL MOORE

A NOTTINGHAM-born aid worker has recalled seeing desperate Gazans risk being struck by bullets to get their hands on food in a chilling account of his time in the strip.

Matthew Hollingworth, who has 25 years of experience working in the world's worst humanitarian crises, said the horrors being faced in the Palestinian territory is "beyond comparison".

The chief of the World Health Organization (WHO) warned that two million people in Gaza are "starving" as Israel began to lift its aid blockade on Monday. The 11-day siege has brought the population to the brink of famine.

At least 53,475 people have been killed in Gaza by Israel in retaliation to the Hamas attacks in October 2023 which killed 1,200 people.

Mr Hollingworth spent six months spearheading the World Food Programme's (WFP) response to the Gaza crisis last year before moving to Lebanon, which is also now caught in conflict. The 49-year-old has worked in Bosnia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Ukraine and across Africa, enduring deadly sieges and bombardments.