Social media images of Gaza cafes can’t hide truth: Israel is starving Palestinians

Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and his supporters have variously argued that there is no starvation in Gaza, or that if there is hunger it is the fault of Hamas – who they accuse of stealing aid – or the United Nations.

In a recent interview with the New Yorker, Amit Segal, the chief political correspondent for Israel’s Channel 12, said he did not believe there was hunger in Gaza. Israel’s consul general in New York said that there was “no deliberate starvation in Gaza, only a deliberate disinformation campaign orchestrated by Hamas”.

Social media has also helped spread misinformation about hunger in Gaza, with photographs and video of cafes being presented as evidence that there is no famine.

One Israeli creator on YouTube with more than 400,000 subscribers posted a video entitled “Summer 2025 (Genocide Never Tasted So Good)”, which highlights the existence of several small cafes in Gaza City in an attempt to disprove the existence of food shortages.

Related: ‘No one should act surprised,’ says UN expert who warned of starvation in Gaza last year

But Israeli government data clearly shows that it is starving Gaza. UN-backed food security experts said that Gaza is currently experiencing a “worst-case scenario” famine. Even Netanyahu’s biggest ally, Donald Trump, has said there is “real starvation” in the territory.

Despite such conclusions, pro-Israeli figures have continued to cast doubt on the veracity of images of malnourished children. In an interview with Piers Morgan, the US media personality Megyn Kelly dismissed such images as having been “manipulated”, before claiming that Hamas and “frankly a lot of Palestinians” are “masters of propaganda and they’re fine having their own children starve just as long as they can put them on camera”.

Such attitudes are reflected in the comments under the Gaza cafes video, where a typical post reads: “It is hard to imagine that people can be so easily fooled into passionately believing the ‘genocide’ and ‘famine’ in Gaza when evidence against such false narratives is so readily available.”

But while a small number of cafes are open in Gaza – including some of those in the video – they are operating in a severely limited capacity due to spiralling prices and scarcity of key ingredients, according to Salah Ahmad, the co-founder of HopeHub, an organization that created co-working spaces for remote workers and students in cafes across the territory.

Basic ingredients are hard to obtain, and prices fluctuate wildly from day to day: a kilo of flour can cost $12 one day, and $40 the next. Consequently, the small array of snacks these cafes are able to still offer are usually extremely expensive, Ahmad said.

“When you see a small coffee shop or cafe selling drinks or cakes at high prices, it does not truly reflect the reality most people in Gaza are living,” Ahmad said. “In many cases, it is just a small business. The owners are simply trying to survive and feed their families with a sense of dignity.”

Of the five cafes in the video, one was not currently open because they ran out of supplies, one said it was reopening after being shut down for several weeks because there were no supplies, and another said it was no longer selling food, Ahmad said.

Often, cafes in Gaza remain open even when they do not offer food, as they provide internet connections and electricity from solar panels, Ahmad said. HopeHub is still operating two co-working spaces out of cafes – one in Khan Younis and one in Deir al-Balah.

Further confusion has been created by the fact that some of the cafes are posting pictures and videos from before they closed down on. Hamada Ice Cream shop, which has not been open for weeks, recently posted a highlight reel of the pastries, cakes and drinks the cafe once served.

“Me and 2 million Gazans are waiting for this moment Oh God, make things easy and these days pass safely, O Lord,” reads the video’s Arabic caption.

The few cafes that are open are obviously not able to serve Gaza’s entire population, Ahmad said. “Most people in Gaza right now are poor and trying to survive,” he said.

Those who do go to the cafes “might be employees who still receive salaries from international organizations, remote workers, or journalists”, he said. “They are holding on to hope, clinging to familiar routines, trying to stay connected to their memories of a more beautiful Gaza. For them, going out for a coffee is not about luxury. It is about staying human.”