Fasting While Starving, Gazans Struggle To Mark Ramadan

On the first night of Ramadan, an aerial image of thousands of Palestinians in Rafah sharing an Iftar meal over a long red table went viral on social media. Stretching hundreds of meters and flanked on either side by destroyed buildings and rubble, the table was adorned with cheese, bread, falafel and olive oil. Clips and images of similar scenes in Beit Lahiya and Gaza City also circulated, showing hundreds of families breaking their fast together over large meals, with lights strung up on hollowed-out buildings in the background. 

The resilience and unity of Gazans in the face of destruction is indeed moving. But such photos have obscured a much more grim reality. 

On March 2, less than 48 hours after Ramadan began, Israel shut all crossings into Gaza, preventing the entry of humanitarian aid and fuel. A week later, Israel cut off the remaining electricity to the enclave, forcing the scaling down of a desalination plant that was providing drinking water to half a million Palestinians in central and southern Gaza. No food has entered the Strip for more than two weeks, making it increasingly difficult for residents to put together a meal to break their fast each evening.

Every day, 70-year-old Jamila Zaqout of Jabalia refugee camp wonders what to prepare for her family. Despite her age, Zaqout is taking care of 10 orphaned grandchildren, whose parents — two of Zaqout’s sons and her daughter — were killed in Israeli attacks, along with her husband. 

“Children need proper nutrition after fasting all day, but all we have are canned foods,” she told +972. “There is an extreme water shortage, vegetables are extremely expensive, and meat is unavailable.” 

Zaqout returned to Jabalia from the southern city of Khan Younis, where she was sheltering with her family at Al-Aqsa University, 10 days after Israeli troops fully withdrew from the Netzarim Corridor which bisected the Strip. Like most of the camp, her home was almost completely destroyed. “I thank God that I found a single room, a hall, and a bathroom, which I managed to make livable using large tarps,” she said.

The ceasefire between Israel and Hamas had given Zaqout some hope; she wanted to believe that it would hold through Ramadan. But no sooner did the holiday begin than Israel escalated its punishment of the enclave’s 2.3 million residents. And with Zaqout’s family relying entirely on aid parcels for food, she has begun to fear that famine is now becoming a real possibility once again. 

“We no longer receive aid, and even the charity kitchens have shut down,” she explained. Her grandchildren walk long distances every day to fetch water, and there is sewage overflow throughout the camp. “Ramadan no longer feels joyful,” Zaqout lamented. “We just feel weak without proper food.”

One of Zaqout’s grandchildren asked to buy Ramadan decorations like they would before the war, and she had to explain to him that they can’t. “Our financial situation is terrible,” she told +972. “We’d rather use what little money we have to feed the children than to buy decorations.”

Still, Zaqout considers her family to be among the luckier ones: that day, she was able to bake mana’eesh with tomato paste, some spices and thyme. “Let’s thank God,” she reassured her grandchildren. “Others struggle just to get a sip of water. At least we have flour to make bread.” 

‘We are overwhelmed by sadness and loss’

Unlike Zaqout, Marwan Joudeh, another resident of Jabalia camp, was able to secure some Ramadan decorations for his five children. “I wanted to bring some joy to their hearts, but honestly, we don’t feel the spirit of Ramadan,” he said. “The camp is in ruins, and every household has a martyr or a wounded person suffering.”

Joudeh’s wife, who used to take pride in preparing elaborate meals to break the fast, now stands in front of their firewood stove wondering what to cook. Due to fears about how little canned food is now available, Joudeh has considered asking his children to refrain from fasting. “There is no nourishment to sustain them,” he explained. 

Extreme food shortages are not the only thing making Ramdan difficult. The Israeli army’s bombing of mosques has made communal worship nearly impossible. “All of the mosques have been destroyed, and there are no Taraweeh prayers,” Joudeh explained, referring to the special recitations performed at night during the month of Ramadan. “We no longer even gather as an extended family for Iftar.”

Despite Israel’s routine violations of the ceasefire agreement, including its new blockade of food and aid, Joudeh reiterates his determination to stay in Jabalia. Each time the Israeli army withdrew from the camp over the past year, he returned. “I set up a tent over the rubble and continued my life,” he said. “I never thought, and never will think, of leaving the camp.”

A few kilometers west of Jabalia, 52-year-old Asmahan Al-Talouli welcomed Ramadan from a school-turned-shelter in Al-Shati camp without four of her children: one daughter who was killed in October 2024 when Israel bombed the school she was sheltering in, another daughter died with her husband and son in a drone strike last June, and her son who went missing in the first week of the war and nobody has seen since. 

Throughout the past year and a half, she never left Gaza City, moving between relatives’ and friends’ homes with her 12-year-old son, Mahmoud, toward whom she harbors feelings of immense guilt. “My son carries a heavy burden; he has grown up too soon,” she said. “He now has to fetch water, collect firewood, shop and cook.” 

Al-Talouli began to cry as she recalled how her family used to celebrate Ramadan. “Iftar is joyless without my children,” she said. “My daughter used to visit me daily, buy groceries, fetch water and prepare the Iftar meal. I have two herniated discs, making it very difficult to move.” 

In the shelter, there is no kitchen and the bathrooms are a long walk away. “At night, we sit in darkness, cooking on an open fire outside our tent because there is no gas,” she explained. 

Raed Al-Ashi, 40, is also marking the holiday in the absence of loved ones. A resident of Tel Al-Hawa in Gaza City, he lost 15 family members — including his mother, four brothers and three of his five children — when their house was bombed in March 2024. Only Al-Ashi, his wife and two of their children survived.

“Unlike other Muslims who welcome this month with joy, we are overwhelmed by sadness and loss,” he said. “The ruin around us and lack of basic necessities make this Ramadan even more painful.”

What Al-Ashi misses most is his mother’s warm hospitality. “I remember how she used to invite us all over for the first day of Ramadan, serving us molokhia with rice and chicken,” he said. “She made Ramadan feel like a time of goodness and blessing. Now, I have lost all of that, and it breaks my heart.”

‘Instead of playing through the night, children are searching for water’

In southern Gaza, residents of Khan Younis camp are relieved to be celebrating Ramadan in what remains of their homes instead of shelters for the displaced. But the extent of the destruction, chronic power outages and lack of food have tempered the celebratory mood, with Israel’s latest closure of the border crossings plunging the camp into a state of panic. 

Amal Abu Mustafa, a 40-year-old mother of five who was born and raised in the camp, was able to reclaim two rooms in her house by replacing the walls with zinc sheets and nylon. “The days of Ramadan are occupied by trying to find water for drinking and general use,” she said. “My daughter, Sara, goes out and tries to bring us food — usually plates of cooked rice without any meat.”

Abu Mustafa explained that the food shortages have driven prices up, yet her husband has no income; he used to work in a shop selling household supplies, earning a wage of about 20 sheckels (around $5.50) per day, but the shop is no longer standing, and he is unable to find a new job. 

During Ramadan last year, Abu Mustafa and her family were displaced to Al-Mawasi as the Israeli army laid siege to Khan Younis. During that four-month incursion, between December 2023 and early April 2024, Abu Mustafa could hear the destruction being wrought in her neighborhood from her shelter near Al-Aqsa University, only a kilometer away. “I heard the sound of explosions, and I felt them in my heart — as though the camp had been completely destroyed,” she said. 

Living in a tent this time last year meant there was no Ramadan atmosphere. “My children did not fast last year because of the lack of food and water and the strong heat from the sun,” she explained. This year, Abu Mustafa’s children alternate between fasting for a whole day and for only half the day. To fast for 12 hours, a person needs to eat two satiating meals — one before sunrise and one after sunset — which is not possible right now. 

“This is a simple camp, and most of the families are poor,” she explained. “Many of them used to depend on UN aid, which has been restricted. So we are in urgent need of relief.”

Like Abu Mustafa, Salem Muqdad experienced last year’s Ramadan in a tent in Al-Mawasi, but he is now back in Khan Younis camp. In more regular times, he explained, he would spend most of his days during Ramadan sitting in the camp’s crowded central market, sending various ingredients and new household items home with his children and their friends — a stark difference from this year’s holiday. 

“Instead of children playing from the late afternoon hours until early morning, they are searching for water or a place to charge their small batteries to light the breakfast table,” he said. 

On top of that, the idea of children roaming around outside makes parents nervous; the camp is full of rubble, and some areas are particularly polluted from chemical byproducts of exploded missiles. 

The walls of Muqdad’s house are completely charred from Israeli attacks — a sight he “can’t bear” — so he asks his children and grandchildren to charge batteries every day so they can brighten the room. “For this,” he explained, “we have to pay 3 sheckels (around 80 cents) per day to charge at the neighbors’ house.”

Muqdad is also struggling to find money to pay for water. “Most of us have no source of income,” he said. “We miss going to the market and shopping at cheap prices. We have begun to crave chicken, meat, fish and fruit.” 

Despite the difficult circumstances, Muqdad and other adults in the camp do what they can to try and cheer up the children.

“There was an initiative to illuminate one of the streets,” he explained. “We hadn’t seen it lit up like this in a year and a half, so we gathered there with the children after breaking our fast and celebrated. This is the only thing that brought joy to our hearts and life back to the camp.”