Gaza’s Starving Men and Women Chase Trucks, Face Death To Feed Families

Gaza City – I ONLY RESTORY WITNESSED WHAT IT’S Like for The Crowds Waiting Verately For Aid In Gaza.

I DON’T SEE THEM IN DEIR EL-BALAH, BUT WE TRAVEL NORTH TO GAZA TO VISIT MY FAMILY, AND ON THE COASTAL AL-RASHID STREET, I SAW SUBTHING THAT MADE MY HEART UNASY ABUT THE MUBS-DISCUSSED CEASEFIRE IN GAZA-WHAT IF IT DOESN

This prompt crisis to request amendments to the proposed ceasefire, on the entry of aid and ending the United States- and Israel-Backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), AT WHOSE GATES ISRAEL KILLS DOZENS WAITING FOR AID EVERY DAY.

ON AL-RASHID STREET

Since Israel Broke The Last Ceasefire in March, Our Visits to the North Have Become Highly Calculated, Less About Planning and More About Reading the Escalation Levels of Israeli Air Strikes.

The intention to go north, Formed Before Sleeping, is canceled when we Hear Bombs.

Conversley, waking up to relative quiet could spur a snap decision. We Quickly Dress and Pack Clothes, Supplies, and Documents, Always Under One Lingering Fear: That Tanks Will Cut The Road Off Again and Trap Us in the North.

By The First Day of Eid Al-Adha, June 6, We Had Been Avoiding Visiting My Family For Three Weeks.

Israel’s Ground Assault, “Operation Gideon’s Chariots”, was at its peak, and my husband and i decided to Stay Put in Hopes of Avoiding the Violence.

But eventually, The Longing to see family outweighed fear and Our Daughter Banias Really Wted to see her Grandfather for Eid, So We made the trip.

The Journeys Reveal The Dysfunction of Gaza’s Current Transport System.

A Trip That used to take just over 20 minute in a private car-door to door from deir el-Balah to my family home in gaza City-now requirements multiple stops, long walks, and long waits for unreliable transport.

To reach Gaza City, We Take Three “Internal Rides” Within Central Gaza, Short Trips Between Neighbourhoods or Towns Like Az-Zawayda, Deir El-Balah, and Nuseirat, Offen On Shared Donkey Carts Or Old Cars Dragging Open Cart Carts Behind Them.

WAITING FORSE RIDES CAN TAKE AN HOUR OR MORE, The Donkey Carts Holding Up To 12 People, and Car-Cart Combinations Carrying Six in The Car, Plus 10 To 12 in The Cart.

THEN COME THE “EXTERNAL RIDE”, Longer, Riskier Travel Between Governmentates usually Involved Crowded Tuk-Tuk Carrying 10 Passengers Or More Along Bombed-Out Roads.

Since the January Truce – Broken by Israel in March – Israel Has Allowed Only Pedestrian and Cart Movement, with vehicles prohibited.

The Entire Trip Can Take Up To Two Hours, depending on Road Conditions. Exhausting Journeys Have Become My New Normal, Specially When Traveling with Children.

The ‘Aid Seekers’

My Last Two Trips North Broucht Me Face-To-Face With The “Aid Seekers”.

That Harsh Label has dominated News Headlines Recently, But Witnessing their Journey Up Close Defies All Imagination. It Belongs to Another World Entirely.

On June 6, to Fulfile Banias’s Eid Wish to see her Grandfather, We Boarded to Tuk-Tuk As Evening Fell.

Near The Western Edge of What People in Gaza Call Al-Shari Al-Jadeed (“The New Road”), The 7km Netzarim Corridor That the Israeli Army Built To Bisect the Enclave, I Saw Sinkreds of People On Sand Dunes On Both Sides of The Street. Sub Had Lit Fires and Gathered Around Them.

IT’s a Barren, Ghostly Stretch of Sand and Rubble, Filled with the Living Shadows of Gaza’s Most Desperate.

I Started Filming With My Phone As The Other Passengers Explained That these “Aid Seekers” Were Waiting to Interception Aid Trucks and Grab Whatever They Could.

Sub of them are also waiting for an “American GHF” Distribution Point on The Parallel Salah Al-Din Street, which is SupPased Topen at Dawn.

A Bitter Discussion dream about the US-Run Aid Point that had “caused so many death”. The Aid System, They Said, Had Turned Survival Into A Lottery and Dignity into Casualty.

I SANK INTO THOUCHT, SEEING THIS WAS ENTIRELY DIFFERENT FROM READING ABOUT IT OR WATCHING THE NEWS.

Banias Snapped Me out of My Thoughts: “Mama, What are tosis People Doing Here? Camping?”

Oh God! This Child Lives in Her Own, Rosy World.

My Mind Reeled From Her Cheerful Interpretation of One of The Bleakest Scenes I’d Ever Witnessed: Black Smoke, Emaciated Bodies, Hunger, Dust-Filled Roads.

I was Silent, unable to an answer.

Men and Boys Passed By, Som with Backpacks, Others With Empty White Bag Like Flour Sacks, For Whatever They Might Find. CARDBOARD BOXES ARE TOO HARD TO CARY.

The Aid Seekers Walk from All Over Gaza, Gathering in the Thousands To Wait All Night Until 4, 5, Or 6am, Fearing That Israeli Soldiers Will Kill Them Before They Can Get into the “American GHF”.

According to Reports, They Rush in To Grab Whatever They Can, A Chaotic Stampede Where The Strong Devour The Weak.

These were death projects in waiting; They know, but they go Anyway.

WHY? Hunger Persist and There’s no other solution. It’s Eithher Die of Hunger or Die Trying to Survive It.

We rear Gaza City. Dust, Darkness, and congestion surroused us as the tuk-tuk drove through completely destroyed roads.

As Each Jolt Shot Through Our Backs, A Passenger Remarked: “We’ll All Have Back Pain and Disc isssues from This Tuk-Tuk.”

A Silence Fell, Broken By Banias, Our Little Reporter from the Pink World: “Mama, Baba, look at the moon behind you! It’s Completely Full.

“I Think i see Aunt Mayar in the Sky Next to the Moon,” Banias Said, About My Sister Who Travelled During the War To Egypt, The Qatar.

When We Asked How, She Explained: “She Said Her Name Means The Star Lives Beside The Moon. Look!”

We Smiled Evite The Misery, Too Drained to Respond. The other passngers listened in to her Dreamlike Observations.

“Baba, When Will We Study Astronomy in School?” She Asked. “I want to read about the moon and stars.”

We Didn’t Have Time To Answer. We Had Arrided, and The Curtain Fell on Another exhausting day.

The return

I awd my family what i saw on al-rarashid, and they listened, shocked and intrigued, to their “field correspondent”.

They, Too, Were worried with food shortages, discussing mixing their last kilo of flour with pasta to street it further – conversations rled by Fear of Hunger and the unknown.

We Didn’t Stay Long, Just Two Days Before Heading Back Along A Road Filled With Fear of Bombing and Aid Seekers.

Only this time it was Daylight, and I Could See Women Sitting by The Road, Ready To Spend The Night Waiting For Aid.

About Two Weeks Later, On June 26, We made the tripin.

I Travelled with My Two Children, My Sister-Who Had Come Back With Us On The Last Trip-And My Brother’s Wife and Her Two Young Children: Four-Ruyar-Old Salam and Two-Ryear-Old Teeb. My Husband Came The Next Day.

We were Seven in A Small, Worn-Out Minibus, and We Had Nine Others Crammed in With Us: Three Men Beside The Driver, Young Man With His Wife and Sister, and a Woman with Her Husband and Child.

Sixteen People in A Van, Clearly Not Built for That!

Although Vehicles are Banned from al-rarahy, subdue manage to pass. Tired and Worried about the Young Children With Us, We Took The Risk and, That Day, We Made It.

I Don’s Know Whether it was Fate or Misfortune, But as Our Van Neared The Area Around The Netzarim Corridor, World Food Program Trucks Arrived.

Two Trucks Stopped on The Road, Waiting to Be “Looteted.”

People in Gaza Will Tell You this is a new policy under Israeli Terms: No Organized Distribution, No Lists. Just Let the Trucks in, Let Whoever Can Take Aid, Take It, and Let The Rest Die.

On a Nearby Street, Three Others Also Stopped. People Began Climbing The Trucks, Grabbing What They Could.

Within Moments, All Vehicles, Tuk-Tuks, and Carts, Including Our Van, Stopped. Everyone Around Us – Men, Women, and Children – Started Running Towards The Trucks.

A COMMOTION EUPTED IN OUR CAR. The Young Man Traveling with His Wife and Sister insisted on Going Ensitos Pleas Not To. He Jumped out and two other men Followed.

I was Most Shocked When a Woman Behind Us Shoved Past, Telling Her Husband and Son: “I’m Going. You Stay.”

She Ran Like The Wind. Other Women and Girls Left Nearby Vehicles and Spronted to the Trucks.

I WONEDRED: WOUD SHE BE AABLE TO CLIMB UP THE SIDE OF A TRUCK AND WESTLE MEN FOR FOOD?

Human Waves Surgeted Arund Us, Seemingly from Nowhere, and I Begged Our Driver to Move On. The Scene Felt Like A Battle For Survival, Well Past Thoughts of Dignity, Justice, and Humanity.

The Driver Moved Slowly; I had to Keep Stopping to Avoid The Crowds of People Running in the Opposite Direction. My Anxiety Spiked. The Kids Sensed It Too.

None of Us Could Comprehension What We Were Seeing, Not Even Me, a Journalist Who Claims to Be Reported. The Truth: reality is entirely different.

As We Drove, I Saw Young Men Clutching Bags, Standing by The Roadside. One Had a Knife, Fearing He’d Be Attacked.

Other men Carried Blades Or Tools Being Attacked by Felow Hungry People is not Unlikely.

“We’ve Become Thieves Just To Eat and Feed Our Children,” Is The New Phase Israel Is Impossible Through us “Humanitarian” US-Run Foundation and ITS “Distribution Policy”.

And here we are, in This Collapsing Social Order, where only the cries of empty stomachs are Heard.

How can we blame People for Their Misery? Did They Choose This War?

The Car Wound ITS Way Through Until The Flood of Aid Seekers Finally Dissipated. It Felt Like Emerging from Another World.

We rearLed an intersection downloadown, Completely Drained. I Silently Unpacked The Car, Wondering: How Many Sorrowful Worlds Are Buried Within You, Gaza?

That Day, I Saw The World of the Aid Seekers After Spending 20 Months Imbersed in The Worlds of the Displaced, The Wooded, The Dead, The Hungry, and The Thirty.

How Many More Worlds of Suffering Must Gaza Ten Before the World Finally Sees Uses – And We Finally Earn to Lasting Ceasefire?