North Gazans Scrounge Animal Feed for Flour as Markets Empty

(Bloomberg) — In the two weeks since Israeli troops scaled back operations in northern Gaza hundreds of thousands of Palestinians are emerging from hiding and adjusting to a grim reality: food is scare.

As the Hamas police force also stirs back into partial operation, its officers are touring markets and issuing orders to keep prices down. A kilogram of lentils mustn’t be priced above 12 shekels ($3.25), they say, and rice eight shekels ($2.16).

But there are so few of these staples that the instructions are meaningless, observed Youssef Fares, a journalist who didn’t heed Israel’s evacuation orders and has been living with his siblings and their families in Jabaliya refugee camp just north of Gaza City.

Mostly what is available, he says, is of no use — seasoning, coffee creamer, candy and gum.

That has led some to gather dwindling animal fodder — corn, wheat, barley — and grind it into flour. Others are venturing into abandoned farm fields to forage for wild greens like spinach, chard and sorrel.

“People risk their lives to collect these herbs,” said Ryad Asaliya, a resident, adding that he mostly eats lemons, which are in season. “Lemon with salt, lemon with red chili paste, pickled lemon.”

After Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, Israeli forces responded with a ground and air assault, sealing off the territory that’s home to some 2 million people and cutting off most of their food and water, as well as fuel and medicine.

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The United Nations’ Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights says starvation is setting in across the coastal strip. In a report last week, it said, “Gazans now make up 80 percent of all people facing famine or catastrophic hunger worldwide, marking an unparalleled humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip.”

Israel says it is stepping up aid entering Gaza, facilitating the arrival of medical supplies and hundreds of trucks with food.

Getting those supplies to the north is complicated and dangerous since Israel doesn’t allow traffic to head to that part of Gaza while it continues to seek out Hamas fighters and infrastructure there.

Asked about hunger in the area, a military official said all civilians are being encouraged to head to safer parts of the south where the aid is available.

Colonel Elad Goren, head of civilian affairs in Gaza for the Israeli military, said at a press briefing last week that from southern Gaza, “You can see pictures in the Arab media of markets selling fruits and vegetables and bread.” Twelve bakeries are open there, he said.

Some of the problem of nourishment in the rest of the territory is because the UN doesn’t move enough trucks when Israel clears them, Goren said, adding, “There is no starvation in Gaza.”

That’s not how those who live in the northern parts see it. “The situation here in the north is famine,” Fares said. “There are no other words to describe it.”

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Majd Hamdouna, who is in Gaza City, also in the north, said some people collect food — bags of salted nuts, peanut butter, and luncheon meat — that Israeli soldiers left behind in houses they were holed up in or from field camps and resell them for prices beyond the capacity of most residents.

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Enas Mohammed, who managed to leave Gaza and is now in Cairo, said her neighbors called her and asked if they could enter her Gaza City apartment to search for food. “They found biscuits, some flour, cooking gas, sugar, tea and coffee,” she said of the things she left behind.

Hamas fighters killed 1,200 people and abducted 240 others when they swarmed into Israel. The death toll in Gaza has risen above 26,000, the majority women and children, according to officials from Hamas, which is considered a terrorist organization by the US and the European Union. The tally doesn’t distinguish between civilians and fighters or include 7,000 missing people.

“While everyone in Gaza is hungry, the people in northern areas face the highest share of catastrophic hunger, exposing them to the grimmest consequences of food insecurity,” said Matthew Hollingworth of the World Food Program, in a statement. “During the few times WFP has been able to gain access to deliver food there, the team saw shocking levels of deprivation.”

As Aeyal Gross, a professor of international law at Tel Aviv University who’s studied food insecurity, put it, supply doesn’t mean all that much if you can’t afford to pay.

“It’s misleading to focus only on how much food enters Gaza,” he said. “The economy is so weak that supply is only part of the story. People have no money.”

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