‘Stripped of our human dignity’: What it means to be hungry in Gaza

Khan Younis, Gaza – What does it mean to be hungry for months?

In Gaza, where more than 43,000 of us have been killed by Israel’s bombardment and ground invasions – and many more thousands are lost, feared dead, under the rubble – we have been punished with hunger now for more than a year.

In war, survival becomes the only focus, and hunger is a constant reminder of that. We have been forced to be hungry – we did not choose this.

We’re struggling to survive under Israeli bombardment, but we’re failing.

It has become clear to us that the Israeli army’s goal is to spread famine across the entire Gaza Strip, from north to south. The fear of hunger has been a constant since the beginning.

At the moment, we live on one meal a day. How I have come to hate the question: “What can we eat?”

The cheese we eat for breakfast is the same cheese we eat for dinner. I have developed a loathing for this type of cheese, but it is the only option we have.

My sister and mother wake up every morning and go to the market looking for any food they can find for my sister’s children, for my brother who goes to work, or for my mother who needs to eat to take her medicine.

They generally return downcast because there is nothing in the market.

We used to think that maybe it was just our neighbourhood that had no food, so we would call our friends and relatives in other areas. But they told us every time that there was no food in their markets besides a little canned food.

When we go out, we see the miserable faces of the vendors who look as if the worries of the world are weighing on their hearts.

When we speak to them they barely reply because there is nothing to buy. Every day, they say the same thing: “The crossing hasn’t opened yet.”

There’s a vegetable vendor in our neighbourhood, Uncle Ahmed, who knows us well. We’ve come to rely on him since the start of this war.

Women sit near their malnourished infants at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir el-Balah in central Gaza on June 1, 2024 [Jehad Alshrafi/AP]

He used to sell his produce in the main market but had to move after the bombing and destruction, now he sells in our neighbourhood.

We’ve lived together through difficult circumstances like the shortage of vegetables and fruits and the frightening rise in prices.

Now, there is nothing on his stand except some peppers, eggplant and a little lemon.

This poor man, ashamed to answer our questions.

Starving as the world is silent

The Israeli army is deliberately starving us. The Karem Abu Salem (Kerem Shalom to Israelis) crossing, through which some aid was arriving earlier this year, has been closed for a month.

It was closed, we were told, for the Jewish holidays but has since not reopened.

People waited and hoped that the end of the holiday was approaching and the crossing would open soon, but that never happened.

We’ve been stripped of our dignity as human beings. I can’t believe what we are living through.

I look at my family and feel so angry that this can be so frightening and the world is silent about what we are living through.

A three-year-old child who suffers from diabetes, a weakened immune system and malnutrition, rests at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital on June 1, 2024 [Jehad Alshrafi/AP]

Our faces have become so pale and we look so tired.

We can barely do normal daily activities. We live on just one meal a day – if that. It is the same meal every day.

My brother Muhammad, who works at what remains of Nasser Hospital, has gotten used to going to work without eating.

He used to reassure us that he could buy food in the nearby market and eat with his colleagues, but then he started asking us to prepare anything we can for him because there’s no food in the market.

If he doesn’t eat anything at all before he goes out, he won’t be able to work and stay up all night at work.

My mother needs to eat when she takes her blood pressure medication and her bone and nerve medications. The tablets are harmful if taken on an empty stomach.

Recently, she has had to take her medication without food because there is nothing to eat.

I feel desperate for her. I am so afraid that she will develop a stomach ulcer.

My sister’s children, Rital and Adam, ask for food constantly.

They tell us they crave chicken and red meat, French fries, biscuits and juice. We don’t know what to tell them.

I’ve started telling them the truth, that the Israeli army closed the crossing. Adam, the three-year-old, responds that he’s going to open the crossing. The situation is impossible for him to comprehend.

When my niece sees food online, she asks us why we don’t eat like that. Why don’t we just buy a chicken?

When Adam goes to the market with his mother, he asks the vendors, “Do you have chicken? I want to eat rice, chicken and potatoes.”

The vendors now know Adam well and they have become invested in finding a chicken for him.

They always ask us: “Did Adam eat today?”

You cannot ration a child

Two days ago, our neighbour came to visit. I could see that she’s lost a lot of weight.

The main topic of conversation is always food these days. She asked us what we ate that day. Did we eat anything different?

She told us that she only eats a little zaatar every day and cannot afford tomatoes, which are now 55 shekels ($20) a kilo – if you find them.

A displaced child lines up for food aid in Deir el-Balah on October 17, 2024 [Abdel Kareem Hana/AP]

She said she goes to the market every day to ask the vendors for food or anything that can be cooked. She told us that she has begun to feel embarrassed in front of the vendors, embarrassed of always being hungry and looking for something to eat.

“I’m diabetic and I need food every day,” she said. “I crave everything.”

She told us that she calls all her relatives and asks them to buy her any food they can find, but they can’t because the famine is in all over Khan Younis now.

We’ve been living this famine in some shape or form since the start of the war.

I remember how we used to go look for food down in Rafah before the ground operation there. But then the Israeli army took control of all the crossings and if you could find food, it was a miracle.

Ten-year-old Yazan al-Kafarna, born with cerebral palsy, lies at a hospital in Rafah, on March 3, 2024. Yazan died due to extreme muscle wastage caused primarily by a lack of food [Hatem Ali/AP Photo]

Before this war began, I could never have imagined being so constantly hungry and having to search for food everywhere.

No matter how much we store food, it runs out. You cannot ration a child. You cannot prevent them from eating if there is food there.

I cannot describe the feeling that comes when your house is left completely without food. It exhausts you every day.

I have now completely lost my appetite. I don’t crave anything. I wonder if this is a stage of starvation.

I feel my passion for life running out.

We try to give ourselves a little hope when we look at old photos of our favourite meals, the restaurants we used to visit, the times we went to the mall to buy anything we needed.

Now, it seems we used to live in great luxury, buying all kinds of food, going to restaurants.

That was during a time when we were not devoid of human dignity and self-esteem.