| « Unscripted: Green Zone Theater and the Shoe Drama | Witnessing the Decay of Western Hegemony and the Role of the Organic Intellectual » |
Hunger Across Gaza As Bread Runs Out
PCAS
My Misery in Gaza pushed me to report on the Hunger of my people. I stopped by al shanty bakery mid of Gaza City. It is one of the biggest bakeries across Gaza which provides tens of thousands with bread. Hundreds of people crowded outside the bakery in a very long long row waiting for a bag of bread. Children, women and men were awaiting their chance to get some of the bread, which is totally running out in Gaza.
Abed Mas'od, 24, is an employee working in Al shanty bakery. I spoke to him while he was very busy preparing bread for thousands. I managed to get some information out of him.
"Our bakery went out of bread days ago and what we have will only last for another 24 hours. In fact, we have stopped our work yesterday as we ran out of flour. Now, we use grain (fodder) used for animals which will finish in hours," the bakery worker said.
Before the deadly crisis of bread, which started 2 days ago, this bakery was using 30 bags of flour for production. (Each of them weighs 60 kilograms.) But today it uses around 100 bags. Abed refers to this rise of bread-making quantity to the increased demand for bread which came after Israel banned transport of flour into Gaza and closed the borders.
Amongst the crowd, a woman's voice rose above all people in the row. She started to scream and appealed for God requesting a salvation and easing for life conditions. I came closer to the woman, then introduced myself and then started to ask her some questions. The woman, Om Ali Shoman,45, with a pale, drawn face expresses the suffering of the entire population.
She said, "This is our destiny. It's a conspiracy machinated against us. What's the fault of my children at home to stay with no bread. Did they fire rockets? Did they kill Israelis? Are they holding guns?
The number of Gaza bakeries is 47 but now the working ones are 14 only.
Normally, Gaza needs 450 tons of flour; 100 goes for bakeries and 300 for home use. Part of this flour is being provided by UNRWA, which recently halted its work. The remaining flour and wheat quantities will cover the needs of Gazans only for the next few days.
Hunger in Photos...Open the link below:
http://picasaweb.google.com/sameh.habeeb/BakeriesOfGazaOutOfBreadPeopleAreHungry#
Sameh A. Habeeb, B.A.
Photojournalist & Peace Activist
Humanitarian, Child Relief Worker
Gaza Strip, Palestine
¤ ¤ ¤ ¤ ¤
Source: http://freegaza.ps/english/
No feedback yet
