With $550M in agricultural losses, Gazans going hungry
Israel’s destruction of Gaza’s agricultural sector has resulted in a drop in food supplied to local markets, inflating prices that are out of reach for the impoverished population.
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Souad Motlaq joins a long queue in Gaza City to get aid from one of the charities that provides food to thousands of Gazan families suffering from food insecurity as a result of the recent Israeli war.
Motlaq was covering her head with a piece of cardboard to try escape the hot sun, sighing as she saw the queue was moving at a snail's pace. She told Al-Monitor indignantly, “This is the first time I have stood in a queue to get food aid. War alone forced me to do this.”
Her seven-member family can no longer obtain food due to its scarcity and skyrocketing prices, which have forced her to resort to relief organizations for food.
The Ministry of Agriculture's undersecretary, Abdullah Lahlouh, warned in an interview with the Palestinian news agency Wafa about the increase in the number of households experiencing food insecurity in the Gaza Strip as a result of the Israeli aggression. Lahlouh said the rate of food insecurity was 58% before the Israeli aggression and was likely to rise.
