More than 4,400 scientists from 87 countries have issued a joint appeal urging an immediate halt to the man-made humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza.

The signatories, among them 14 Nobel Prize winners, five Fields Medalists, 21 Breakthrough Prize recipients, 34 Dirac Prize winners, four Wolf Prize laureates, and two Abel and Turing Prize holders,  warned that “nothing in this historical record” can “justify” the devastation inflicted on Gaza’s civilian population.

The statement, dated August 21, 2025, also included the names of 85 Israeli scientists, among them David Harel, president of the Israeli Academy of Sciences and Humanities. Signatories span the globe, with Italy contributing the highest number (921), followed by Spain (449), the United States (429), France (326), Brazil (267), the United Kingdom (247), Switzerland (138), Japan (112), and the Netherlands (104). India accounted for 310 signatories, the fifth-highest number worldwide.

'Act immediately to end this human-made humanitarian crisis'

Signed in their personal capacities, the scientists denounced the “artificial shortage of food… leading to a famine-like situation,” the “enforced denial of medical facilities,” the “absence of even a modicum of education for children,” and the “systematic annihilation of civil infrastructure (including universities).” The statement underscored a pervasive “disregard for the rights, well-being, and life of the civilian population of Gaza.”

The scientists also decried the killing of “tens of thousands of innocent lives” in Gaza, including nearly 1,000 infants under the age of one.

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The signatories stressed that “nothing in this historical record” can “justify” the horrors endured by Palestinians in Gaza. They urged the Israeli government to “act immediately to end this human-made humanitarian crisis” and called on governments and international institutions worldwide to “exert all available means so there is a halt to this tragedy.”

UNICEF warns ‘the unthinkable’ is already unfolding in Gaza City

The UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) warned on Thursday that a catastrophe is already underway in Gaza City as "Israel" intensifies its aggression, with food and medicine running out and functioning hospitals being targetede.

Tess Ingram, UNICEF’s Communications Manager for the Middle East and North Africa, described the city as “a place where childhood cannot survive” after spending nine days on the ground. “The unthinkable is not looming. It is already here,” she told reporters in New York.

Out of 92 UNICEF-supported nutrition centers, only 44 remain operational, leaving thousands of malnourished children without treatment. Hospitals are collapsing under strain: just 11 are partly functioning, with only five neonatal units. 40 incubators are serving nearly double their capacity, keeping as many as 80 newborns alive on fragile power supplies and dwindling medicines.

Ingram recounted meeting families displaced multiple times, mothers who lost children to hunger, and young patients with bodies “shredded by shrapnel.” Famine, she said, was “everywhere I looked in Gaza City.”

She highlighted the case of a mother, Nesma, whose two-year-old daughter recently died from malnutrition after aid blockages cut off treatment. Her surviving child is “barely hanging on.”

UNICEF has reportedly provided emergency food for more than 3,000 children, along with support for infants, pregnant women, and access to safe drinking water. But the agency warns that far more is needed and is seeking $716 million this year to respond to the crisis.

“The cost of inaction will be measured in the lives of children buried in rubble, wasted by hunger and silenced before they even had a chance to speak,” Ingram stressed, urging "Israel" to allow greater aid access, and for states with influence to press for an end to the war.