- By Fergal Keane
- BBC News, Jerusalem
2 hours ago
video caption,
Mohammed Zo'rab is one of thousands of children in Gaza who have become key food collectors for their families
In certain places and times, a boy can take pride in staying alive – let alone going out every day to find the food that will keep the family from starving.
Every morning, Mohammed Zo'rab, 11, goes on a mission to the southern city of Rafah in the Gaza Strip.
He picks up a large plastic bowl and heads to schools-turned-refugee centers and makeshift roadside camps where people like his own family are suffering but may still be able to find something to feed strangers' children.
Mohammed also goes to hospitals where the wounded arrive around the clock, and anywhere else where a pot is boiling over an open fire.
“When I come back to my family with this meal, they are happy and we all eat together,” he says.
“Sometimes I leave empty-handed and feel sad.”
Mohammed is the eldest of four children and lives with his mother, father and siblings in poor accommodation made of plastic and tarpaulin.
His father Khaled roams Rafah looking for odd jobs to raise five shekels (about $1.38; £1.08) to buy diapers for their two-month-old daughter Howaida.
Mohammed is one of thousands of children who have become the primary food collector for their families.
“When the line is full and there are almost 100 people in front of me, I sneak between people,” he says, proud of his ability to navigate large crowds without getting into fights.
At home, he gives the bowl of baked beans to his mother, Samar, who distributes the food to the other children. She is thin and hardly eats.
“I have cancer in my bones,” she reveals. “I'm 31 years old, but when you see me you think I'm 60. I can't walk.”
“When I walk, I get very tired. My whole body hurts and I need treatment and nutrition.”
Like so many others, Samar and her family came to Rafah from their home further north in Khan Younis because the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) told them it was safe. That was three months ago.
Since then, the war has moved ever closer to Rafah. More than 70 people were killed less than two weeks ago when Israel launched a raid to rescue two hostages held by Hamas.
The Zo'rab family's shelter is leaking and the ground is filling with rain. Sometimes Baby Howaida doesn't have fresh diapers.
In a place where 1.5 million people – five times the normal population – are crowded together on the Egyptian border, every day offers relentless humiliation.
With 85% of Gaza's population now displaced, the amount of aid reaching the enclave is nowhere near what is needed.
According to the United Nations (UN), five hundred relief trucks are needed every day. The daily average was ninety.
The situation is particularly acute in the northern Gaza Strip.
Israel says the United Nations is failing to distribute aid in the north and that aid is secured and waiting to be picked up on the Gaza side of the border.
The organization has stopped transporting food aid to northern Gaza because of a lack of protection for truck drivers who have faced attacks from criminal gangs and looting by desperate people.
A truck was hit by shells that the UN said came from an Israeli naval ship.
In addition, the Hamas-run police in Gaza are no longer willing to escort food trucks for fear of being shot by the IDF.
“Give us back our people”
image description,
Zvika Mor's eldest son Eitan is a hostage in Gaza
In Israel, military warfare is still supported by a large majority.
There is no discernible opinion in favor of increasing aid efforts to civilians in Gaza. In a recent poll, 68% of Jewish respondents said they opposed the transfer of humanitarian aid to Gaza while Hamas was still holding Israeli hostages.
In contrast, 85% of Arab Israelis surveyed were in favor of help.
Zvika Mor, whose eldest son Eitan is being held hostage in Gaza, speaks of a boy who was “the first to call me daddy” and how much he, his wife and their other seven children miss the young man kidnapped by Hamas on October 7th.
Eitan acted as an unarmed security guard at the Nova music festival, where Hamas killed an estimated 360 people in and around the area.
Mr. Mor leads a small group of hostage families who want to return their relatives before negotiations with Hamas begin. They oppose a government deal that would make this conditional on a ceasefire, an increase in humanitarian aid in Gaza and the release of Palestinian prisoners.
“Israel does [a] Humanitarian crisis in Gaza. Because our goal is to release our people,” says Mr. Mor.
“We want our people, okay? And before all the negotiations and other things, first give us our people.”
Asked if that wasn't harsh, considering that the lives of civilians in the Gaza Strip were at stake, Mr. Mor replied: “Yes, but we have babies and women and the elderly, okay?”
“It’s very, very simple. Give us our people and we will give you food and medicine. So easy.”
In Gaza, charities are using what's left of their food resources to provide aid.
Mahmoud Al-Quishawi of the U.S.-based charity Pious Projects of America stood near the boiling pots of beans where Mohammed received food for his family.
“We try tirelessly every day to help these people … to tell them: 'We are with you, we will not leave you alone,'” says Mr. Al-Quishawi.
As the charity has run out of bottled gas to heat food, volunteers are collecting wood and keeping fires burning.
“The atmosphere is dark,” he says. “The situation is catastrophic.”
There were reports of children dying of malnutrition in northern Gaza. The British charity Action Aid quoted a doctor in northern Gaza as saying that a significant number of children had died.
In a video recording, Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya, head of pediatrics at Kamal Adwan Hospital, said malnutrition and digestive system infections were widespread.
According to Action Aid, one in six children under the age of two have been screened for IDP [internally displaced persons] In January, acute malnutrition was found in shelters and health centers.”
According to the charity, this represents a “decline in the nutritional status of a population that is unprecedented in the world for three months”.
Another medic at Al-Shifa Medical Complex, also in northern Gaza, said he treated a two-month-old boy named Mahmoud Fatouh who died shortly after arriving at the hospital.
“This child could not be supplied with milk. His mother was not given any food to breastfeed him,” says Dr. Amjad Aliwa.
“He had symptoms of severe dehydration and was on his last breath [when he came]”.
In Gaza, civilians are stranded where war and hunger have kept them.
With additional reporting from Alice Doyard, Haneen Abdeen, Gidi Kleiman and Stephanie Fried.