Starvation in Mosul forces civilians to eat grass, cats to survive

Hardship faces civilians in the besieged neighborhoods by Iraqi joint forces in the right bank of Mosul.


People in these neighborhoods suffer from constant random shelling by governmental forces that inflicted thousands of victims.

Iraqi Observatory for Human Rights (IOHR) told stories of Mosul families' tragedies as starvation forced families during the past six months to hunt for cats, birds and eat grass.

One of these stories is the tragedy of Abu Balsam Family that managed to escape the old city of Mosul by going through the city's sewers to Federal Police-held zone.

Abu Balsam's family of four told their tragedy to IOHR as the youngest member Balsam (four years old) said that when the family's food storage, vegetables and wheat ran out, his father hunted down birds from their house's roof so he can provide for his family.

'Other families hunted cats and sold it to us, they made a huge web and put chicken, birds bones in it to lure the felines and then sell its meat for the city's people to survive,' Balsam added.

Balsam also complained from the bad taste of the cats and from rotten wheat distributed by ISIS terrorists.

As the governmental siege on the city lasted for six months, ISIS terrorists prevented food from civilians and only distributed it to the families of the group's members.

Balsam's sister (six years old) told another part of her family's tragedy as they were forced to eat grass that grew after rain fell on the city.

IOHR reported that this tragedy caused several ailments and malnutrition maladies to civilians, especially children.

The observatory urged the Iraqi government to provide medical aid to displaced civilians as soon as possible to lessen the human crisis intensity in the right bank of Mosul.


https://www.thebaghdadpost.com/en/sto...ats-to-survive