Faced with major food shortages after nearly 14 months of war, Palestinians describe long days hunting for flour or bread in the conflict-ravaged Gaza Strip.
Every morning, crowds form outside the few bakeries open in the Palestinian territory, as people desperately hope to secure a little food.
“I walked about eight kilometres (five miles) to get bread,” said Hatem Kullab, a displaced Palestinian living in a neighbourhood of makeshift tents.
Since the outbreak of Israel’s war on Gaza last year, charities and international aid organisations have repeatedly warned of crisis levels of hunger for the enclave’s two million or so people.
A United Nations-backed assessment last month warned of famine looming in northern Gaza as an Israeli offensive all but halted the arrival of food aid to the area. Water and medicines are also scarce.
People across Gaza now wake at dawn to try to ensure they can get some flour or bread, as availability reaches an all-time low.
“There is no flour, no food, no vegetables in the markets,” Nasser Al-Shawa, 56, said. Like most residents, he was forced to leave his home because of the bombings and lives with his children and grandchildren in central Gaza.
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The price of the available food has skyrocketed.
Inside Gaza, where more than half of the buildings have been destroyed, production is almost at a standstill. Flour mills, warehouses storing flour and industrial bakeries are unable to function because they have been so heavily damaged by strikes.
Humanitarian aid is trickling in but aid groups have repeatedly complained that Israel places many constraints on them – an accusation Israel denies.
The United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) announced on Sunday that it was halting aid deliveries to Gaza via the key Karem Abu Salem (Kerem Shalom) crossing point, saying that deliveries had become impossible, partly due to looting by gangs.
For Layla Hamad, who lives in a tent with her husband and seven children in southern Gaza’s al-Mawasi, the UNRWA’s decision was “like a bullet to the head”.
She said her family had regularly received “a small quantity” of flour from the UNRWA.
“Every day, I think we will not survive, either because we will be killed by Israeli bombing or by hunger,” she said. “There is no third option.”
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