Six Palestinians describe their struggle with hunger amid the war

Deir el-Balah and Khan Younis, Gaza, Palestine – Ghada al-Kafarna stood in line outside the community kitchen in central Gaza as she does every day. It was 11am and the mother of 10 had been there for the past two hours.

“For me, securing food and bread is a constant battle,” the 41-year-old explained as hundreds of children, women and men jostled around her.

Ghada has no source of income and her husband suffers from a chronic illness that prevented him from working even before the war.

Now the family, which was displaced from their home in Beit Hanoon in the north, lives in an UNRWA school turned shelter in Deir el-Balah and relies on tekkiyyat, community or charity kitchens distributing free meals.

“When the tekkiyyat stop, I have no choice but to beg neighbours for food,” she said.

Ghada is exhausted.

“My children haven’t eaten anything today. For the past four days, the charity kitchens have been closed because of the difficult situation, and my children have gone to bed hungry every night,” she explained tearfully.

“I ask people around me and beg them every day for help.”

_{^{Ghada al-Kafarna waits at a community kitchen in Deir el-Balah to receive a meal of lentils for her children [Abdelhakim Abu Raish/Al Jazeera]}}

But most people are in the same position as Ghada and are unable to offer her family any assistance.

In October 2023, when Israel began its war on Gaza, it announced a “total” blockade on essential supplies to the Strip. In the more than 14 months since, Israel has restricted 83 percent of the food aid entering Gaza, according to the United Nations.

International aid organisations and charities have repeatedly warned of crisis levels of hunger affecting the more than 2 million people in Gaza while Israel has been accused of using starvation as a weapon of war.

On December 1, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) said it halted the delivery of aid through Karem Abu Salem (known as Kerem Shalom to Israelis) – the main crossing point for humanitarian aid between Israel and Gaza – due to security concerns such as theft by armed gangs.

^{_{Children wait to collect food at a community kitchen [Abdelhakim Abu Riash/Al Jazeera]}}

This has only intensified the struggles of families like Ghada’s already devastated by more than a year of war.

It has taken a massive toll on her mental and emotional wellbeing.

“I feel humiliated and degraded, begging every day to secure food for my children. I wish for death daily because of this endless struggle,” she said.

“When my children cry from hunger, I sometimes lash out at them in frustration. Last night, I hit my eight-year-old son because he was crying for food,” she revealed, her voice filled with anguish.

“He cried himself to sleep, and I spent the night in tears.”

“Our situation is beyond words. Stop this tragedy. We are exhausted,” she pleaded.

_{^{Mohammed Abu Rami goes daily to a tekkiyyat in Deir el-Balah to collect the sole meal his family will eat for the day [Abdelhakim Abu Raish/Al Jazeera]}}

Like Ghada, Mohammed Abu Rami is entirely reliant on community kitchens to feed his family of 11.

The 58-year-old makes the daily trip from his tent in a temporary camp in Deir el-Balah to line up at a charity kitchen with two of his sons, often arriving at least two hours before the food distribution begins.

“Without the tekkiyyat, we wouldn’t be able to eat at all,” he explained.

“Last week, when the charities were closed, we went entire days without food. Our survival depends solely on what they provide.”

Holding a plastic container as he waited, Mohammed describes how his family, which was displaced from Gaza City, lives “below the poverty line – no work, no money, no medicine”.

“We haven’t received any food aid in over five months,” he added, his voice heavy.

“Who can we turn to in the midst of this famine? What can we say? We are dying under the bombardment, hungry and cold. We only have God,” he said.

“Our patience has run out. I never imagined living through such unbearable days. This is deliberate starvation – a war within a war.”

_{^{A group of displaced people gather at the Sanabel Community Kitchen, which provides daily meals in Khan Younis, southern Gaza [Abdelhakim Abu Raish/Al Jazeera]}}

It was around 11:30am and Karima al-Batsh was struggling to stay in a queue outside a bakery as people around her tried to reach the front to buy bread.

She had been there since five in the morning and had arrived to find hundreds of people already waiting – everyone competing for the same scarce item of food.

While thousands of Palestinians line up daily at community kitchens, an even larger number of people gather outside bakeries from the early hours of the morning, desperate for bread given the severely depleted supply of wheat flour due to Israel’s restrictions.

“I have no flour, and there’s none available in the markets,” explained the 39-year-old. “We haven’t received any aid.”

After Karima and her family were displaced from Gaza City’s Zeitoun neighbourhood to Deir el-Balah, her husband was killed in an Israeli air strike. The mother of four now braves the crowds outside bakeries, which have for many become a stark symbol of the deepening humanitarian crisis in Gaza, where hunger and desperation have pushed people to their limits.

“The scene is one of chaos and heartbreak,” said Karima as she waited for her turn. “Everyone is fighting for crumbs of bread to bring back something to their families.”

“The hunger is overwhelming, and the jostling is relentless,” she added.

“Last week, three women in Deir el-Balah died from suffocation in a stampede. How can the world allow this to happen—people dying for a loaf of bread?”

_{^{Mohammed Dardouna arrives in the early hours of the morning to stand in line at a bakery [Abdelhakim Abu Riash/Al Jazeera]}}

Mohammed Dardouna emerged from a bakery queue – what he referred to as “the battle for bread” – his clothes dusty and his face etched with exhaustion.

“Our life is like zeft (black like tar),” said 42-year-old Mohammed angrily, using a local expression to convey the inescapable hardship Palestinians are facing, a small bag of bread on his shoulder.

“I wake up at 5am to fetch water for my family. From 8 to 9am, I search for tekkiyyat to find food for my children. Then, I stand in line for hours to get bread, now scarce due to the flour shortage,” he explained, describing his daily routine in Deir el-Balah.

“This is the summary of life in Gaza now for many like me.”

Mohammed, a father of eight, was displaced from Jabalia in northern Gaza where the estimated up-to-95,000 Palestinians who live there face starvation and malnutrition. The independent Famine Review Committee has warned that famine could be “imminent” in areas in the north.

“I used to have a good life – a job, a small shop, an income, and my own home,” he reflected. “We endured the horrors of war, but to face hunger like this is unimaginable.”

With the price of a 25-kilogramme (55-pound) bag of flour soaring to more than 1,000 shekels ($280), Mohammed voiced the desperation of many. “Who can afford even a fraction of that now?” he asked.

“If this continues, we will bury ourselves alive. Death feels like the only escape,” he said.

“I never imagined a day when I would go hungry or watch my children starve. Stop the war. Let the flour in. How do we appeal to the world? Shame on you.”

_{^{Fadia Wadi sifts flour full of weevils before kneading it [Abdelhakim Abu Riash/Al Jazeera]}}

Fadia Wadi finds herself resorting to using spoiled flour infested with weevils and worms after being unable to endure the massive crowds at the bakery gates.

“As you can see, this flour is spoiled, full of insects, and has a terrible smell,” Fadia explained as she painstakingly sifted out bugs before kneading the flour into dough. “But what choice do I have? Flour is either unavailable or too expensive.”

The 44-year-old mother of nine says hunger has forced her to make unimaginable compromises. Her eldest son was killed in an Israeli strike in northern Gaza in January, while her husband remains in the north, leaving her to provide for their eight remaining children.

“The war has pushed us into doing things I never thought I’d have to do just to feed my children.”

Although her children are reluctant to eat bread made from spoiled flour, Fadia feels it is safer than queueing at bakeries.

“I tried to get bread two days ago, but I came back covered in bruises from the stampede,” she explained while kneading. “A tragic, difficult life.”

While collecting food puts people at risk of being caught in a stampede, they also face the threat of Israeli strikes.

With vegetables, meat and poultry and basic staples like rice and pasta now unavailable or prohibitively expensive, Fadia has no option but to cook with insect-infested flour.

“Flour is missing, aid is scarce, and aid parcels haven’t arrived for months. How can I provide bread or food?” she asked.

“We used to throw this spoiled flour to the animals, but now we feed it to our children, not knowing or caring about the health risks,” she added. “Hunger drives us.”

Now dependent on charity distributions, Fadia describes a life dominated by endless waiting and long queues. “Everything here is a line — food, bread, water, everything,” she said.

“We are hungry, we crave everything. I don’t know what will happen to us.”

_{^{Alaa al-Batniji shops at the local vegetable market in Deir el-Balah [Abdelhakim Abu Riash/Al Jazeera]}}

Alaa al-Batniji stood in front of a vegetable stand in Deir el-Balah carefully choosing the few vegetables he could afford for his family of four children.

“The prices are unbelievable,” remarked the 38-year-old. “We used to buy vegetables by the kilo, but now it’s by the piece — at insane prices.”

Bustling markets, once a source of sustenance for many, have become unattainable destinations for most displaced families due to prices skyrocketing since the start of the war.

“Every day, we hope the situation improves, but it doesn’t. I never imagined seeing such extreme inflation, starvation, and hardship in my lifetime,” said Alaa, who was displaced from Shujayea neighbourhood east of Gaza City.

“I bought two onions today for six shekels each — $3 for just two onions. In the past, I could buy a whole kilo for one shekel. Two tomatoes cost me 10 shekels ($2.80) each.”

“The prices here make it feel like I’m shopping in Chicago or Paris,” Alaa added. “Onions and salt … have now become luxuries in Gaza.”

He put two onions in a bag. “I feel sorry for the people enduring these unbearable conditions. We’re tired.”

Also read: UN General Assembly calls for unconditional ceasefire in Gaza

Source: Maram Humaid-Al Jazeera