Home > Olives & Thorns > Archives > 2008 > September > 01 > Entry
Ramadan in Gaza
Mahmoud Mustafa al-Deri isn’t sure how it could get worse.
Last year was bad, he said. This year, he is without work, with eight children to support, relying on food handouts.
On the first day of Ramadan, there was no meat on the floor, where the gathering family broke their fast at sundown. Only rice, potatoes, bread and small bowls of shredded cabbage and diced tomatoes.
“Do you think it’s a life to turn into a beggar, taking money from here and there?” Mahoud told me today in the dimmed light of the home he built years ago from his steady job laying tile floors in Israel.
Mahmoud lives in the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood of Gaza City, the faded metropolis of a garbage-strewn patch of sand that is one of the most densely populated places on earth. Gazans call it the world’s largest prison.
Since Israel and Egypt closed its borders with Gaza more than a year ago, a response to the ascent of the militant group Hamas, Gaza’s unemployment has soared. The al-Deri family’s struggles are remarkable because they are typical.
Mahmoud, the son of Palestinians refugees, put down tile floors in Israel for 31 years until the Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation erupted in 2000. Later, he found similar work in Gaza. But now, with Israel’s restrictions on the transfer of goods into Gaza, there are few building supplies for new construction and people like Mahmoud have lost their jobs.
He has turned to fishing in Gaza’s polluted waters to cobble together some kind of living.
“Now, I carry the pole everyday to the sea, hoping to catch some fish. This is my day’s work,” he said.
Otherwise, he depends on rations from the United Nations and an Islamic charity funded by Hamas.
“If Israel won’t open the borders, I think we should find a new place to survive,” he declared, after breaking the first day’s fast on what is normally a festive month-long holiday, “because this place is no longer for us, with such conditions.”
Comments
By suha
September 2, 2008 8:59 AM | Link to this
Ahh that is so sad. What the Israelis won’t agree to hire palestinians who blow their buses? Every one dies in the end. I simply cannot understand the Israeli crulty
By Christina
September 10, 2008 5:20 PM | Link to this
Yes, suha, you’re so right — Mahmoud Mustafa al-Deri is obviously a terrorist, and should be punished for laying subversive flooring. I mean, he’s probably planting explosives in the floor tiles! What a great reason to disregard international law and collectively punish an entire people. I applaud your brilliant reasoning.