Young people set up initiatives to help Gaza displaced as UN falls short

In a bid to help displaced people to overcome their dire situation in the devastated Gaza Strip, young people from the territory have launched their own charitable initiatives in various refugee camps.

Cooking food, establishing temporary tents, distributing water and supplying food are among the main services that they are providing to tens of thousands of displaced people. 

"Every day, we cook for more than 5,000 Palestinian displaced families, mainly those who live in the tents and do not receive any food from the international organizations," Islam Ayoub, one of the organisers of the initiative in Rafah in the south of the Gaza Strip, told The New Arab. 

Ayoub, who was displaced from Gaza city to Rafah two months ago, said that "the people are really struggling to obtain their human basic needs, mainly food and water (…) Most of them left their houses without getting any of their things or even money." 

"Even the local people became hostages to death, poverty and disease because of the overcrowding in places of shelter, mainly in the schools," he added. 

In the Gaza Strip, home to more than 2.3 million people, nearly all of whom have been displaced from their homes, there are many UN organizations operating. However, because of the huge number of refugees and Israel's relentless assault, they are unable to meet their basic needs, according to Adnan Abu Hasna, a spokesman for UNRWA. 

Abu Hasna told TNA that his organization can distribute food twice a week only, which means that almost half of the displaced people are starving and sometimes spending whole days without eating.

'No one can imagine our situation'

This is why Ayoub and 30 other volunteers decided to take the matters into their hands and provide food to the displaced people. 

"No one can imagine the situation we live in here. Only we can describe their situation. We have to bear our responsibility towards our people as well as our families," Ayoub said. 

Palestinians in the Gaza Strip have been subjected to an unprecedently brutal and indiscriminate Israeli war, which has so far killed nearly 22,000 people and injured over 56,000 more. The war began on October 7 last year, when Hamas launched a surprise attack on Israel, killing an estimated 1,200 people and taking around 240 hostage.

At least 70 percent of housing units have been destroyed, according to the Gaza governmental media office.

The ferocious Israeli attacks have forced tens of thousands of people, including women, children, hospital patients and the elderly to sleep in the streets even during the cold weather. 

"When I saw such scenes in our city of Rafah, I really was shocked and cried. First of all, my friends and I hosted some women with their children in our houses, but due to the great number of displaced people, we had to set up tents for them in the western part of Rafah," Samid Zourob, another initiative organiser, told The New Arab. 

"We have built more than 1,000 tents for the displaced people and we are continuing our efforts to provide more and more in order to at least protect the families from the cold weather," he added. 

 Zourob worked with UN organizations to build public toilets in the refugee camp in order to allow people to have some basic hygiene.

Both Zourob and Ayoub have received donations, from local people and Arab and foreign donors. They said they hope to receive more money to cover as many areas of Gaza as they can.

Winter sets in

Among the many needs that people in Gaza have at this time of the year is clothing to protect them from the cold weather.

Halima Baraka, a Khan Younis-based woman has launched her own initiative to distribute winter clothes to the displaced women and children in her area. 

"As Palestinian women, we have dozens of clothes in our wardrobe. But now there are tens of thousands of other women who have nothing, so it is time for us to give them clothes to keep them warm," the 29-year-old mother of four told TNA. 

She called on all local and displaced women who could meet their clothing needs to distribute some of their clothes to displaced people.