‘We don’t want you to die’: Palestinian mom’s children fear for her life as she sets out to get food

Gaza City, Gaza — 

It’s a long and dangerous walk to the point through which trucks carrying aid into Gaza are expected to pass. Um Khader and other women who live in the tents neighboring hers are huddled next to a car in the dark, surrounded by a large crowd of men.

Not many women can be seen around the bonfires dotting the horizon near Gaza City on this night in June, captured on video. The sole providers for their children, this group of mothers sticks together for protection. The most dangerous part of their journey is yet to start.

They could come under Israeli fire and, once the aid trucks arrive, they will have to jostle their way through thousands of men if they hope to get their hands on a bag of flour and keep it.

“Everything around us is a risk to our lives, whether it’s thieves, Israeli soldiers, rockets or drones. Everything,” says Um Khader, a mother of three.

Her friend Walaa recounts what happened the previous day, when she managed to get a bag of flour after waiting 10 hours from dawn to dusk. “Then a young man with a knife said, ‘drop the flour or I’ll kill you,’” she says. She handed it over.

Awful choice

The trickle of aid allowed into Gaza, the breakdown of law and order and the dismantling of United Nations-led delivery systems have created new levels of desperation, according to aid groups. The fittest struggle to survive and the most vulnerable are left with nothing.

Over the course of several weeks in June and July, WNN followed a group of Palestinian women facing an awful choice between risking their own lives, which could deprive their families of their only remaining provider, or watching their children starve.

The crisis is also exacting a heavy toll on pregnant and breastfeeding women, WHO said, with recent data showing that over 40% were severely malnourished.