One in three children under the age of two in the northern Gaza Strip suffers from acute malnutrition, the United Nations’ children agency has warned, as Israel’s total blockade of aid enters its third week.

In a statement on Saturday, UNICEF said fast-spreading malnutrition among children in Gaza is reaching “devastating and unprecedented levels” due to the deep effects of Israel’s war and ongoing curbs on the delivery of aid into the territory.

The agency said acute malnutrition had doubled in a month, affecting 31 percent of children under two in February, compared with 15.6 percent in January. Among children under five, acute malnutrition has surged from 13 to 25 percent, it added, citing nutrition screenings carried out by UNICEF and its partners.

“The speed at which this catastrophic child malnutrition crisis in Gaza has unfolded is shocking, especially when desperately needed assistance has been at the ready just a few miles away,” said Catherine Russell, UNICEF’s executive director.

She added that despite repeated attempts to deliver aid, the situation for children in Gaza “is getting worse by each passing day”.

“Our efforts in providing life-saving aid are being hampered by unnecessary restrictions, and those are costing children their lives,” Russell said.

The deal reportedly on the cards is an extension of the ceasefire for up to 60 days in exchange for between five and 10 living Israeli captives held in Gaza.

While Hamas has previously rejected a similar deal, they may be more amenable after direct meetings between US hostage envoy Adam Boehler and top Hamas officials in recent weeks. Boehler had said that the meetings went well and suggested a deal was on the cards for a potential long-term ceasefire, prompting a backlash from Israel and pro-Israeli US politicians.

There are even reports that Boehler has been taken off the Israel-Gaza file, but those reports may be premature.

For perspective, there are 220 Democrats in the House of Representatives, all of whom have been unabashedly vocal in their criticism of the Trump administration’s actions on a near-daily basis.

There are 45 Democrats in the Senate.

But only a select number of self-styled progressives including Ilhan Omar, Ayanna Pressley, Summer Lee, and Al Green – the man thrown out of President Donald Trump's State of the Union speech last week – were willing to add their names to language that leaves no room for interpretation.

“We are horrified by the recent illegal abduction and now indefinite detention of Mahmoud Khalil – a US legal permanent resident – by Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agents, and we unequivocally demand his immediate release from DHS custody,” the letter said.

“Khalil's arrest is an act of anti-Palestinian racism intended to silence the Palestine solidarity movement in this country,” it read. “He is a political prisoner.”

Among those notably absent from the document was Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, otherwise known as AOC. She grew her brand as a member of the so-called "Squad" of progressive women in the House of Representatives but came under fire throughout Israel’s war on Gaza as she adopted what many saw as a more establishment-friendly tone within the Democratic Party.

After a social media firestorm, AOC’s chief of staff said she would have definitely signed the letter if it wasn’t too late, and that she was simply “waiting on a detail before signing”.

“Unfortunately, the letter was closed before that detail was confirmed,” he said on X.

“There are potentially logistical reasons for that, or just internal congressional process reasons for that,” one Democratic strategist working on Palestinian advocacy in Congress told Middle East Eye.

“I do think more lawmakers have spoken out than signed that letter.”

By the end of the day, it was revealed that AOC had signed a similar letter along with fellow New York Democrats serving at the local level.

Columbia University is located in New York City.

Nur Shams is located just outside the northern coastal city of Tulkarem, which has been subjected to increasingly violent Israeli raids in recent years, particularly in the Tulkarem refugee camp.

Israel’s quick, deliberate destruction of the Tulkarem and Nur Shams camps has uprooted thousands of inhabitants and upended countless lives in days.

Hamdan Fahmawi’s shop was damaged and vandalised in the raids – the third time in a year.

On February 26, the 46-year-old, who had left the area, made the risky decision to return with his 17-year-old son and some staff to inspect his shop in Nur Shams and retrieve some cash and important paperwork.

“Israeli soldiers eventually told us to get out [of the shop and leave the camp], so we did. One of them raised his gun at us and we felt we were in danger, but thankfully nobody got hurt,” said Fahmawi.

On Thursday, the Geneva-based Independent International Commission of Inquiry said in a new report that Israel “intentionally attacked and destroyed” Gaza’s main fertility centre while simultaneously blocking medicine for pregnancies, deliveries and neonatal care from entering the enclave.

In its report, the commission found that Israeli authorities “have destroyed … the reproductive capacity of Palestinians in Gaza as a group through the systematic destruction of sexual and reproductive healthcare”, it said in a statement.

Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned the UN investigation for “false accusations, including absurd claims”.

Khalil, a 29-year-old Palestinian student, was arrested from his university residence in New York’s upper Manhattan over the weekend by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, who said they would revoke his permanent residency – popularly known as a green card – at the behest of the Department of State. Though no federal charges have been pressed against Khalil.

“This is the first arrest of many to come,” President Donald Trump wrote on Monday on his Truth Social platform, describing Khalil as “a radical foreign pro-Hamas student”.