Humanitarian aid pallets fell by parachutes, opening up on the hungry and exhausted population of the Gaza Strip.
On the ground, most people were forced to leave their homes and focus on a small part of the territory. In tent fields, they struggle to get food, water and medicine. Many houses, trades and neighborhoods that made up their old lives were sprayed, leaving little to return when the war ended.
In the two years since the Hamas attack to Israel on October 7, 2023, Israel launched a large -scale military offensive in Gaza, causing a destruction without recent parallels. The result is a destructed society. More than 67,000 people were killed – the equivalent of 1 in 34 residents – according to local health officials.
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Last month, a United Nations commission concluded that Israel committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. Israel denies the accusation and states that its goal is to destroy Hamas and recover hostages captured in the group led attack, which killed 1,200 people.
On Monday, Israeli and Hamas negotiators had conversations in Egypt about a possible exchange of Israeli hostages to Palestinians arrested in Israel. An agreement could boost the new plan presented by President Donald Trump to end the conflict after several failed attempts.
Still, it is unclear who – if anyone – would manage the territory or finance the reconstruction of lives in Gaza.
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Meanwhile, most fight only to survive.
“Thinking about life after the war is only possible when the war is over,” said Hamza Salem, a former freeder who lost both legs in an Israeli bombing at the beginning of the conflict.
Injured bodies, destroyed lives
Before the war, Salem lived in northern Gaza with his wife and four children. The 5 -year -old girl, 5 -year -old, enjoyed making beads of beads and had just begun her kindergarten.
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“Life was going, thank God,” he said.
Everything changed with the war.
In the first weeks of the conflict, an Israeli attack hit close to the rital, severed his right arm, according to his father and his father, Abdel-Nasr Salem, also injured in the explosion. The Israeli army said he attacked Hamas military infrastructure.
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Three months later, already refugee in southern Gaza, Salem was hit again and had to amputate both legs above the knee.
Both face difficulties to receive treatment, as Gaza’s health system collapsed.
Israeli forces repeatedly evacuated, invaded and bombarded hospitals, claiming that Hamas uses them as a shelter. Less than half of the 36 Gaza hospitals operates partially, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
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With the advancement of war, drugs became scarce, and cancer treatments and dialysis have virtually disappeared. After Israel block all the entry of humanitarian aid in the spring, hunger spread. In August, international experts stated that more than half a million people faced a “man -made hunger”, with cases of acute malnutrition and inanition deaths.
Malnutrition and trauma can affect the physical and mental development of a generation, warn specialists.
“Children face the risk of getting sick or dying daily,” said Tess Ingram, UNICEF spokesman in Gaza. “This level of toxic stress is not just harmful – it can be fatal in the long run.”
Israeli authorities minimize the severity of hunger, saying they work to allow help to enter. The government has classified the hunger report as “absolute lie.”
The Israeli army states that it attacks only military targets and follows international law. He accuses Hamas of building command centers, arms deposits and combat tunnels in densely populated civilian areas, as well as setting up homes and streets.
According to WHO, more than a quarter of the 167,000 injured in Gaza suffered “permanent impact injuries” and more than 5,000 lost members.
With their borders closed, residents cannot escape the bombing or seeking treatment abroad.
The rital arm could not be reimplanted, said Salem. Due to lack of hospital supplies, he had to buy anesthesia and medicines at local pharmacies.
The explosion that injured him made him unconscious. Upon waking, ten days later, I had no legs anymore.
Without proper medication, he developed an infection and was released from the hospital with intense pain.
The family flew again in September, after a new Israeli offensive over the city of Gaza. They walked to the central region, pushing the wheelchair into sand and wreckage streets.
Today, they are sheltered at Salem’s sister’s house, without money, clothes, or a tent if they need to escape again.
“We have no other place to go,” he said.
Ruined communities
The UN estimates that almost 80% of Gaza buildings have been damaged or destroyed. In December, the agency calculated more than 50 million tons of rubble – the equivalent of 105 trucks working for 21 years to clean everything. In February, the World Bank estimated physical damage to $ 29.9 billion, 1.8 time the combined annual GAZA and West Bank GDP.
But the numbers do not capture everything that has been lost. Delete Marcos from everyday life – the grocery store, coffee, barber shop – and life as it was also disappears.
For Nidal Eissa, the father of three children and owner of a bridal store in the city of Gaza, Life revolved around the building where he lived with 30 relatives. Today, it is in ruins, as is the orchard and the trades of the neighborhood.
“I lived my best days in this house,” said Eissa, 32.
The family celebrated births and marriages there. The building was destroyed in August after an Israeli bombardment. Eissa and the relatives managed to escape in time after the warning of a neighbor.
Now they live in a tent in southern Gaza.
“If the war is over and there is a change in the regime, I will open a business and stay in my country,” he said. “The most important thing is to change the system that led us to destruction.”
Lost Childhood
Mahmoud Abu Shahma, 14, lives in a tent near the beach. Spends the mornings looking for water, make tea in firewood and eat bread with spices – or what to find. It has been out of school for over two years.
“If there was a school, I would,” he said.
The parents were killed, leaving him among the thousands of orphans of the war.
According to the Palestinian authority, more than 39,000 children lost at least one parent; 17 thousand lost both.
Shahma lives in one of the seven fields that house more than 4,000 orphaned children in southern Gaza. Another 15 thousand depend on these fields to eat and receive basic care.
Humanitarian employees report frequent cases of anxiety, nightmares and children who stopped talking after severe trauma.
More than 700,000 children are without formal education. Almost all schools need reconstruction, and all universities are closed, many destroyed.
Improvised schools appear in camps. The Mayasem NGO, for example, offers basic Arab, English, Mathematics and Science classes.
“Here they can feel children,” said Najla Abu Nahla, director of the organization.
A collapse economy
Before the war, Mona al-Ghalayini was one of the few prominent businessmen in Gaza. He owned a supermarket, a restaurant and luxury Roots hotel by the sea.
Today, almost nothing was left.
“The supermarket was looted and burned. The restaurant is over. The hotel needs to be rebuilt from scratch,” said Egypt’s phone, where he took refuge at the beginning of the conflict.
She opened a Palestinian restaurant in Cairo and says she wants to return, one day, “when there is stability, water and light – the components of life.”
Gaza was already poor before the war under partial blockade of Israel and Egypt. Even so, local entrepreneurs invested in malls, restaurants and farms. The war paralyzed all formal activity, and unemployment exceeds 80%, according to the World Bank.
More than 70% of irrigation wells, greenhouses and fishing boats have been destroyed, and less than 2% of agricultural lands are still affordable.
The index of “multidimensional poverty”, which considers income, education and access to basic services, should rise from 64% to 98%.
Among those who try to rise are Hassan Shehada, 61, a confectionery that employed more than 200 people. One of his studios was destroyed, and another cannot operate for lack of electricity.
Even so, he maintains an unlikely hope:
“Israel cannot give up on us, and we cannot give up Israel,” he said. “Without a real and lasting peace, nothing will work.”
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