Israel: Gaza Woman Died of Leukemia, Not Starvation

By Eric Mack    |   Sunday, 17 August 2025 06:59 PM EDT

Just days after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rebuked media propaganda as the 8th front of its war versus Iran and its terrorist proxies, Israel is calling out gotcha media attempts once again.

The Associated Press and the BBC had reported on a Gaza woman who died in Italy of “malnutrition” or starvation just days after Netanyahu told a Newsmax event this week that the only ones starving in Gaza are the hostages.

But Israel brought facts and receipts to counter the buying into of the “Hamas propaganda”: the woman who died had cancer.

Israel is slamming the BBC and syndicated outlets for what it calls a deliberate smear campaign because Marah Salad Mahmoud Zohry, 20, was battling an aggressive form of leukemia.

The false reporting has drawn sharp criticism, including from U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee, who ridiculed the BBC on X.

“Will the BBC retract the story and apologize?” he wrote, sharing the original reporting. “Of course. The same day a Baskin Robbins opens a franchise in hell.”

Zohry was evacuated with her mother from Gaza to Pisa, Italy, last week under a humanitarian program coordinated by Israel and the Italian government. She died Friday after less than two days of treatment.

International coverage — led by the BBC and echoed by AP — highlighted her “emaciated” condition and framed her death as proof of Israeli-caused starvation in Gaza. Italian news agencies also emphasized “severe malnutrition.”

What these reports left out, Israeli officials revealed, was the crucial fact that Zohry had promyelocytic leukemia.

“This is not journalism,” Oren Marmorstein, spokesman for Israel’s Foreign Ministry, wrote on X. “This is Hamas propaganda.”

Israel’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) published their Aug. 9 medical file from Nasser Hospital in Gaza, which documented a dire diagnosis: leukemia, pancytopenia (bone marrow failure), pleural effusion with high LDH, and convulsions.

Zohry’s evacuation was approved by Israel after Italy requested urgent transfer. COGAT added that earlier transfer dates had been offered but delayed.

“This young woman suffered from leukemia, not starvation,” COGAT wrote on X. “Israel continues to facilitate medical transfers, especially for children, while Hamas exploits such cases for propaganda.”

The case is the latest in what Israeli officials describe as Hamas’ coordinated “Starvation Campaign” — an effort to mislead the world by attributing deaths from disease or chronic conditions to alleged Israeli food blockades.

Netanyahu recently cited multiple examples of Hamas recycling tragic deaths into a narrative of famine in Gaza.

Earlier this month, The New York Times was forced to walk back similar claims after it ran a front-page photo of a supposedly “starving” Gaza boy who was later revealed to suffer from cerebral palsy.

While the BBC narrative spread, Israel stresses aid continues to pour into Gaza. COGAT said that nearly 1,700 trucks of supplies, mostly food, entered Gaza last week, with 2,250 trucks collected and distributed by the United Nations and NGOs at the Kerem Shalom and Zikim crossings.

“More consistent collection and distribution by U.N. agencies and international organizations = more aid reaching those who need it most,” COGAT noted.

The U.N. insists 600 trucks are required daily to feed Gaza’s two million residents, but Israel maintains it has allowed sufficient aid. Netanyahu says the real problem lies in Hamas disruptions and U.N. mismanagement, not any Israeli blockade.

“Thank you, Newsmax, for helping us on the eighth-front war: seven fronts against Iran and its proxies, the eighth front — the battle for truth,” Netanyahu told Newsmax CEO Christopher Ruddy after his introduction at the Jerusalem Newsmax event Wednesday.

“And, Newsmax, you have let the truth circle the globe against the lies that have circled it before and continue to do so.

“There’s only one way to beat the lies, and that’s with the truth.”

Eric Mack 

Eric Mack has been a writer and editor at Newsmax since 2016. He is a 1998 Syracuse University journalism graduate and a New York Press Association award-winning writer.