Hunger becomes a deliberate instrument of war
Since the United Nations unanimously declared the deliberate starvation of civilians a war crime in 2018, the world has watched that declaration go unenforced while over 21,000 attacks on food systems have unfolded across fifteen countries. In Gaza, Sudan, Yemen, and beyond, hunger has been refined into a weapon — markets bombed, farmland struck, aid convoys blocked — with more than 10,300 civilians killed or wounded simply for seeking something to eat. The resolution exists; the political will does not. What is documented here is not merely a humanitarian crisis but a sustained, collective failure to honor the commitments nations make to one another in the name of civilization.
- A drone struck a crowded Sudanese market on a Tuesday morning, killing 28 people at the precise moment civilians filled the stalls — a pattern researchers say is deliberate, not incidental.
- Gaza alone has absorbed 9,013 food-system attacks since 2018, making it the most food-violent place on earth, while Yemen, Sudan, and Syria follow in a grim hierarchy of engineered hunger.
- Women are eating less so their children can eat more, traveling farther into dangerous terrain to find food, and absorbing risks that researchers warn will leave developmental scars on an entire generation.
- UN Resolution 2417 — a unanimous condemnation of starvation as a war crime — has sat unimplemented for eight years, its existence serving more as a monument to stated intention than a check on actual violence.
- The machinery of starvation is accelerating, not slowing: Insecurity Insight documents a marked increase in deliberate targeting of the infrastructure — water, farmland, markets, distribution networks — that communities depend on to survive.
Eight years after the United Nations unanimously condemned the deliberate starvation of civilians as a war crime, a new analysis documents more than 21,000 attacks on the systems that keep people alive — markets, farmland, water infrastructure, aid distribution networks — across fifteen countries. The specificity is devastating: 1,261 market strikes, 863 attacks on food distribution systems, nearly 2,000 military strikes on farmland.
The occupied Palestinian Territory has endured more of these attacks than anywhere else on earth — 9,013 since 2018. Yemen follows with 1,863, Sudan with 1,605. The pattern is consistent: where armed conflict rages, food becomes a target. In May, a drone struck a market in the Sudanese town of Ghubaysh at the moment civilians crowded the stalls. Twenty-eight people died. Between October 2023 and the end of 2025, more than 10,300 civilians were killed or injured simply trying to reach food aid — shot at checkpoints, struck while standing in distribution lines, caught in crossfire while attempting to survive.
Women bear the heaviest share of this burden. They travel farther, eat less, and absorb greater risk so their children might not go hungry. The consequences extend far beyond the immediate: children deprived of adequate nutrition cannot develop as they should, and the damage, researchers note, lasts a lifetime. Meanwhile, crises in places like Mali unfold largely unseen — livestock stolen, aid convoys blocked, the slow strangulation of survival unfolding without headlines.
The international community possesses a tool it has declined to use. Resolution 2417 stands as a unanimous commitment against the weaponization of hunger. Eight years on, it remains unimplemented. Christina Wille of Insecurity Insight was unsparing: the resolution has not failed — member states have failed to act on it. Conflict drives more than half of all severe hunger globally, and two-thirds of people facing acute food insecurity live in just ten war-affected nations. The machinery of starvation continues to turn, carefully documented, repeatedly condemned, and persistently unchecked.
In the eight years since the United Nations unanimously condemned the deliberate starvation of civilians as a war crime, attacks on the systems that keep people alive have only intensified. A new analysis documents more than 21,000 incidents of what researchers call food-related violence—strikes on markets, farmland, water systems, and aid distribution networks—across fifteen countries. The numbers are staggering in their specificity: 1,261 attacks on markets where families buy their daily meals, 863 incidents targeting food distribution systems and killing workers in the process, 1,909 military strikes on farmland, 563 on water infrastructure essential to crops. But numbers alone do not convey what it means when hunger becomes a deliberate instrument of war.
The occupied Palestinian Territory has endured 9,013 of these attacks since 2018, more than any other place on earth. Yemen follows with 1,863 incidents, Sudan with 1,605. Syria saw 1,538 attacks, many attributed to government or Russian forces before the Assad regime fell. Mali recorded 1,415. The pattern is unmistakable: in places where armed conflict rages, food itself becomes a target. On a Tuesday in May, a drone struck a busy market in the Sudanese town of Ghubaysh. Witnesses said the military appeared to deliberately choose the moment when civilians crowded the stalls. Twenty-eight people died.
The violence extends beyond the moment of impact. Between October 2023 and the end of 2025, more than 10,300 civilians were killed or injured simply trying to reach food aid. They were shot at checkpoints, caught in crossfire, struck by ordnance while standing in distribution lines. The act of survival itself became dangerous. Researchers at Insecurity Insight, the organization that compiled this analysis, found that the weaponization of hunger has accelerated markedly in recent years—a marked increase in the deliberate targeting of the infrastructure communities depend on to eat.
Women bear a disproportionate burden in this landscape. They travel longer distances to find food, exposing themselves to greater risk in volatile areas. Many have shifted from caregiving to breadwinning, often by eating less themselves so their children might eat more. The consequences ripple forward: children without adequate nutrition cannot play, cannot learn, cannot develop as they should. The damage, researchers note, lasts a lifetime. Giulia Contò, an advocacy manager at Action Against Hunger, observed that while the famines in Gaza and Sudan have dominated headlines, the relentless daily attacks on food systems in dozens of other places unfold largely unseen—livestock stolen, markets bombed, aid convoys blocked, the slow strangulation of survival.
Yet the international community has a tool it refuses to use. In 2018, the UN Security Council passed Resolution 2417, a unanimous condemnation of starvation as a tactic of warfare and the unlawful denial of humanitarian aid. Eight years later, the resolution remains largely unimplemented. Christina Wille, director of Insecurity Insight, was direct about the failure: it is not that the resolution has failed, but that member states have failed to implement it, have failed to demonstrate the political will to prevent the very actions they claim to oppose. Conflict remains the primary driver of hunger globally, accounting for more than half of all severe hunger. Two-thirds of people facing acute food insecurity are concentrated in just ten nations, most of them at war. The machinery of starvation continues to turn, documented and condemned, but unchecked.
Citas Notables
Famine in Gaza and Sudan has captured global headlines over the past two years, but most conflict-induced hunger never does. It unfolds daily, with relentless attacks on the systems communities depend on to survive.— Giulia Contò, Action Against Hunger
It is not that resolution 2417 has failed, but that member states have failed to implement it, and to demonstrate the political will to prevent those very same actions that the international community claims to oppose.— Christina Wille, Insecurity Insight
La Conversación del Hearth Otra perspectiva de la historia
Why does targeting food systems matter more than other military targets in a conflict?
Because it's the difference between fighting an army and starving a population. You can rebuild a bridge. You cannot rebuild a child's development if they spent their formative years malnourished. Food systems are the infrastructure of survival itself.
The numbers are enormous—21,000 incidents. Does that number actually capture what's happening, or is it just a statistic?
It's both. Each incident is a specific moment—a market bombed, a convoy blocked, a person shot at a distribution point. The 21,000 is what those moments add up to when you count them across eight years and fifteen countries. It's the pattern made visible.
You mentioned women are disproportionately affected. Why specifically women?
Because in most conflict zones, women are the ones responsible for feeding their families. When food becomes scarce or dangerous to obtain, they're the ones who have to make impossible choices—travel farther and risk assault, or reduce their own intake so children eat. The burden falls on them first.
The UN passed this resolution in 2018. Why hasn't it stopped anything?
Because passing a resolution and enforcing it are entirely different things. Member states would have to actually investigate violations, hold perpetrators accountable, impose consequences. That requires political will. It's easier to condemn starvation than to do something about it.
What happens to a child who grows up in a conflict where food is weaponized?
The damage is permanent. Malnutrition in early childhood affects brain development, learning capacity, physical growth. These aren't things you recover from later. A generation of children in these places will carry that deficit their entire lives.