Fighting in queues for bread, despair in shelters: War threatens Gaza’s tight-knit society

JERUSALEM – A fight breaks out in a bread line. Residents had to wait hours for a gallon of salty water that made them sick. Scabies, diarrhea and respiratory infections are rampant in overcrowded shelters. Some families have to choose who eats.

“My children are crying because they are hungry, tired and can’t go to the toilet,” said Suzan Wahidi. A toilet. “I have nothing to give them.”

As Israel’s war with Hamas enters its second month, more than 10,000 people have been killed in Gaza and trapped civilians are struggling to survive without electricity or running water. Palestinians who have managed to escape Israel’s ground invasion of northern Gaza are now facing food and medicine shortages in the south, and there are no signs of an end to the war sparked by Hamas’ deadly Oct. 7 attack.

More than half a million displaced people have been crammed into hospitals and shelters converted from United Nations schools in the south. The school is overcrowded, flies are everywhere and swarm in, and it has become a breeding ground for infectious diseases.

Hundreds of aid trucks have entered Gaza through the southern Rafah crossing since the war began, but aid groups say this is just a drop in the ocean. For most, each day becomes a chore of finding bread and water and waiting in lines.

A sense of hopelessness has strained Gaza’s tight-knit society, which has weathered decades of conflict, four wars with Israel and a 16-year blockade since Hamas seized power from Palestinian rivals. .

Witnesses said that some Palestinians even vented their anger on Hamas, shouting insults at officials or beating police officers, scenes that would have been unimaginable a month ago.

“Everywhere you go, people’s eyes are full of tension,” said Yousef Hammash, an aid worker with the Norwegian Refugee Council in the southern town of Khan Younis. “You can tell they are on the verge of collapse. “

Supermarket shelves are nearly empty. Bakeries have closed due to lack of flour and oven fuel. Much of Gaza’s farmland is inaccessible, and there are few markets for produce other than onions and oranges. Households cook lentils on the street over low heat.

“You would hear children crying at night asking for sweets and hot food,” said Ahmad Kanj, 28, a photographer at a shelter in the southern town of Rafah. “I can not sleep.”

Many said they had been without meat, eggs or milk for weeks and were now eating just one meal a day.

“Malnutrition and people going hungry is a real threat,” said Alia Zaki, a spokesperson for the U.N. World Food Program. She said what aid workers call “food insecurity” is the new baseline for Gaza’s 2.3 million people.

Famous Gaza dishes such as jazar ahmar (juicy red carrots stuffed with minced lamb and rice) are a distant memory, replaced by dates and packed crackers. Even those are hard to find.

Every day, families send their most confident relatives to one of the few bakeries still open before dawn. Some carried knives and clubs – they said they had to be prepared to defend themselves if attacked, and riots occasionally broke out as people scrambled for bread and water.

“I sent my sons to the bakery and eight hours later they came back covered in wounds and sometimes without bread,” said Etaf Jamala, 59, who fled Gaza City for the southern town of Deir al-Bala. Jamala said. She slept in the hospital’s crowded lobby with 15 family members.

A woman told The Associated Press that her 27-year-old nephew, a father of five in a refugee camp in the northern Gaza city of Jabaliya, was stabbed in the back with a kitchen knife after being accused of cutting off a water line. He needed dozens of stitches, she said. She spoke on condition of anonymity out of fear of reprisal.

The violence has unsettled the tiny territory, where surnames are tied to community status and even small amounts of discretion can be magnified in the public eye.

“Gaza’s well-known social fabric is fraying due to anxiety, uncertainty and loss,” said Juliette Touma, a spokesperson for the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees.

Israel cut off Gaza’s water supply shortly after the Hamas attack and said it would lift its full siege of Gaza only after the militants released about 240 hostages. Israel has since opened pipelines to the center and south but has no fuel to pump or treat the water. The faucet is dry.

Those who cannot find or afford bottled water rely on unfiltered, salty well water, which doctors say can cause diarrhea and serious gastrointestinal infections.

“I don’t recognize my son,” said Fadi Ihjazi. The 3-year-old lost 5 kilograms (11 pounds) in just two weeks and was diagnosed with a chronic intestinal infection, she said.

“Before the war he had the cutest baby face,” Ihaz said, but now he has chapped lips, a yellow complexion and sunken eyes.

Dr. Ali Uchisi, who treats patients at the shelter in Deir al-Balah, said lack of water makes it difficult to maintain even basic hygiene in the shelter. Lice and chickenpox had spread, he said, and I treated four cases of meningitis on Wednesday morning alone. This week, he also received 20 cases of hepatitis A liver infection.

“What worries me is that I know the cases I’m seeing in shelters are only a small percentage of the total cases,” he said.

For most AIDS, there was no treatment—zinc tablets and oral rehydration salts disappeared within the first week of the war. Frustrated patients have attacked doctors, Uchisi said, describing being beaten this week by a patient who needed a syringe.

Sadeia Abu Harbeid, 44, said she missed chemotherapy for breast cancer in the second week of the war and couldn’t find painkillers. Without regular treatment, she said, her chances of survival were slim.

She barely ate, choosing to give most of the little food she had to her two-year-old. “It’s a shame that this exists,” she said.

Rare scenes of dissent are unfolding across Gaza. Some Palestinians openly challenge the authority of Hamas, which has long ruled the enclave with an iron fist. Four Palestinians across Gaza spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because they feared reprisals for what they saw and heard.

A man scolded by Hamas officials for cutting bread lines picked up a chair and hit himself on the head, according to a rescue worker in the queue. In another area, an angry crowd threw rocks at Hamas police, who slashed at the waterline and beat them with fists until they dispersed, a journalist there reported.

Over the past few nights in Gaza City, Hamas rockets have been flying toward Israel from above, sparking outrage inside U.N. sanctuaries. In the middle of the night, hundreds of people shouted insults at Hamas and chanted for an end to the war, according to a 28-year-old man who slept in a tent with his family.

At a televised news conference on Tuesday, a blank-looking young man with a bandaged wrist pushed his way through the crowd, disrupting a speech by Hamas Interior Ministry spokesman Iyad Bozum.

“Hamas, may God hold you accountable!” the man shouted, shaking his injured hand.

With Gaza’s future still uncertain, Israeli tanks roar through Gaza City’s ghostly streets with the goal of overthrowing Hamas. Palestinians say things will never be the same.

“The Gaza I knew is just a memory now,” said Jehad Ghandour, 16, who fled to Rafah. “The place or anything I knew no longer exists.”