The blockade of Gaza and the fighting there that followed the Hamas attack on Israel are the cause of a major humanitarian crisis in the Palestinian enclave. Christians determined to remain in the north and deprived of all help are not immune. Bishop William Shomali speaks about their living conditions, victims of fear, panic and hunger. This Lent your faith will not weaken.
Marie Duhamel Vatican City
“Ending the war is the safest way to bring trucks with supplies to Gaza, so that is the most important thing.” The fight against hunger is the main priority highlighted by the Latin Patriarchal Vicar for Jerusalem and Palestine, Dom William Shomali. According to the United Nations, 2.2 million Palestinians, the vast majority of Gazans, are currently at risk of “mass hunger” in the enclave. On Sunday the 25th, hundreds of civilians remaining in the north, driven by hunger, decided to move to the center and south of Gaza. A father told AFP that he left with his oneandahalfyearold daughter because she could not digest bread made with fodder.
In the city of Gaza, the situation of Christians and other civilians remaining there is critical. The hundreds of people seeking refuge in Latin and Orthodox communities are surviving as best they can. “I heard today that a 30/40yearold man is happy if he gets a quarter of bread a day,” says Dom Shomali. But despite the “extraordinary” lack of food, fear of the future and the loss of thirty relatives in battle and natural death, the community remains determined to die “in their home, near the altar,” in the words of Sister Nabila Saleh, nun of the Rosary Congregation of Jerusalem, located in the Church of the Holy Family in the Zeitoun district.
For security reasons, it is safer to stay in the parish as there is at least one reference house there. The church listens to them. If we can ship something at some point, we will.
Therefore, for security reasons, it is better to stay in the north unless one can leave Gaza via Rafah to enter Egypt. Some succeeded. A month or two after the war, people received visas to Australia and were able to leave. Others who also had foreign passports, Jordanians, were able to leave. But the others don't have this option and don't want to go to the south because they are anonymous there, have no accommodation and are not accompanied. In addition, it is very difficult to live alone in the south. There are not enough tents to accommodate everyone, you have to sleep outside. So it's safer to stay in the community.
So what Sister Nabila said is true and people insist on it. How many times have the Israelis ordered everyone without exception to evacuate the north? Our people said: “We stay here, we prefer to die here.” And they didn't leave. For our part, we try to protect them as best we can through mediation and make recommendations to all politicians who visit us. Well, there was pressure on this and a few days ago, when new evacuation orders were issued, we made our contacts and the soldiers said, “Not yet, you can stay.” It was the first time we had this “You can stay.” “heard.
An internally displaced Palestinian family who fled northern Gaza Strip camps in western Khan Younis, southern Gaza Strip, on February 21, 2024. EPA/MOHAMMED KNOW
Dom Shomali, they stay, but in what state of mind? Lent began on February 14th. Have you been able to contact her since then?
Lent began on February 14th, Ash Wednesday. We received photos from the celebration in the Latina community. We see that people have an Ash Wednesday face, a tense, sad, not very optimistic face. That has changed in the last five months. These are no longer the people we knew a year ago, for example, and who were very optimistic, happy and smiling back then. That's where they really panicked, afraid of what was going to happen. They have been through different situations and continue to move forward full of fear, panic, but also hunger.
You talk about hunger. What are your living conditions today? Specifically, can they feed themselves?
At the beginning of the war, the two communities recovered much of the food that had been stored in the warehouses that were still open. They were sent a lot of money and were able to shop in these northern warehouses. We buy a lot of rice, sugar, flour. We cook every day. Now we do it three times a week, sometimes twice…or sometimes just once a week. And people have to get by as best they can. Sometimes people go to their houses, if they have not yet been destroyed, to look for some rice or some flour that is left over. So “live”. But day by day the situation is becoming more difficult because there are no more food depots, shops, small shops, big shops. There is literally hunger in the north. I heard today that a 30 or 40 year old man is happy if he gets a quarter of bread a day, which is not enough for breakfast. He thanks the Lord for having a quarter of bread. There is an extraordinary shortage of food.
Does it have consequences when people eat so little every day, a piece of bread or a bit of sardine?
This is not enough to have strength and immunity to diseases. There are people in the Orthodox community who suffer from hepatitis. It can be due to unsafe water, poor nutrition, or poor hygiene. They don't have enough water to wash or even drink. Therefore we can predict many diseases.
When we talk about aid, we know that it is arriving little by little, mainly through the Rafah border crossing. Are these trucks or the supplies they carry arriving in the north?
In the south there are these trucks that sometimes drive by and never arrive. We need more than 500 trucks a day, but according to statistics, only 100 or 200 trucks are enough for 2 million starving people. That's really not enough. Especially because it's not just food that gets into the Gaza Strip. There are also tents, medicines or useless things. Many things are missing, especially food.
And what reaches the south does not reach the north for several reasons. The main road connecting the north to the south was bombed several times, making travel to the north very dangerous and even impossible for vehicles or trucks. It is also forbidden to drive from south to north. The Israelis are urging residents of the north to seek refuge in the south but not to return because they want to occupy the northern Gaza Strip. So not much can happen in the north. We use animals because the roads are impassable. And all the raisins you can get are on the black market and very expensive, ten times more expensive than before. I'll give an example… in the case a rare hypothesis of finding eggs. A carton of eggs that costs 25 shekels in Bethlehem or Ramallah would cost 140 shekels today in the north of the Gaza Strip… When can something like this happen? Flour costs ten times more today than it used to.
A family on the beach at sunset near the Rafah refugee camp in the southern Gaza Strip, February 16, 2024. EPA/HAITHAM IMAD
He spoke of the church's possible help for Christians in Gaza. How do you organize yourself so you can send them help?
Our prayers did not bear fruit in either peace or ceasefire, but acts of solidarity were carried out. The truth must be told, not only by Christians, but also by several countries: Egypt or Jordan. Jordan sent a military plane on December 24 to bring tons of food to our Christians in northern Gaza. A Jordanian helicopter dropped two tons of food and medicine. I found out today (last week, editor's note) that the contents were a donation from an American family. We receive many donations from churches, parishes, communities or individuals who are saddened to see photos or videos of Gaza on television or in the media. There is a lot of solidarity and we are grateful for that.
In short: what do you think would be the priority today?
Today the priority is the end of the war, a ceasefire, an armistice, the exchange of hostages and prisoners. All this to bring a lot of help. In fact, the surest way to attract more food trucks is to end the war. So that's the most important thing.
Individuals can put pressure on their governments, so that they in turn put pressure on Benjamin Netanyahu's government to end the war. You know, many, many Israelis, more than we can imagine, want the war to end. The soldiers sent to Gaza have parents and families. The parents of soldiers are afraid for their children. The colonies in the south are no longer inhabited due to the war with Hamas, and the same is true in the north due to the war with Hezbollah. Even the Israeli economy is suffering. More than 100 billion shekels were spent on this war. And even Israel's good reputation was damaged worldwide by this conflict. Therefore, ending the war is an imperative, not only for Palestinians or Europeans, but also a demand of half of Israeli society. Let whoever has influence use their influence to end this war as quickly as possible. This is what we want, so that larger quantities of humanitarian aid can get into Gaza. That is our request.
A Palestinian family displaced from Rafah seeks shelter in Deir Al Balah, south of the Gaza Strip, February 16, 2024. EPA/MOHAMMED KNOW