Gaza City, Gaza Strip – Every day is a struggle for Ghadeer Nassar, as she fights to provide for her seven children. They live together in a small classroom at Remal Model School, alongside other displaced Palestinians. While some goods have returned to Gaza’s markets after months of shortages, the real challenge for families like Nassar’s is finding the money to buy them.
Economic Hardship and Limited Income
Ghadeer’s husband has no stable source of income, even before the war, which began in October 2023. He relies on temporary work, which provides the family—whose children range in age from nine months to 14 years—with little financial stability. On some days, he earns no more than seven or 10 shekels ($2.27 or $3.25).
Desperate to provide for her children, Ghadeer has resorted to selling personal items like her wedding ring and her husband’s phone. When money is unavailable, she turns to bartering. Once, she exchanged one kilogram of rice for four kilograms of lentils, which could feed her family for longer.
“I try to make whatever food we have last as long as possible,” she said. “I don’t buy what I want, I buy what I can afford.”
Changing Consumer Behavior in Gaza
Maher al-Khudari, a shop owner in Gaza City, says that purchasing patterns have changed dramatically compared with before the war. Although larger quantities of goods are now available, prices remain high due to shortages and the cost of bringing in and transporting products. Most residents have exhausted their savings and lost their jobs.
Shop owners face a daily dilemma: customers need food, but many can no longer afford to pay for it. Al-Khudari says some people ask to buy necessities on credit, but that puts him in a difficult position.
“People come wanting to buy on credit, but their circumstances are difficult. I am also someone trying to make a living, and if I give everyone who needs help credit, I will lose everything, because all of Gaza is in need,” he explained.
Al-Khudari has noticed that those who are buying from him aren’t buying what they used to: the person who would buy a kilogram of vegetables now purchases a few pieces, while things like sweets have become luxuries.
“The problem is that people do not even have the minimum amount of money to secure a piece of bread,” he said.
Food Insecurity and Economic Collapse
According to the United Nations, food insecurity remains high in Gaza. The World Food Programme notes that while the entry of commercial and humanitarian supplies has increased in the last two months, the number of households reporting that they were finding it difficult to buy goods from markets because of unaffordability had also increased.
With Israel unwilling to allow reconstruction to properly commence in Gaza, and the Palestinian enclave’s economy to rebound, the current situation is likely to continue. That forces the territory’s population, the majority of them displaced, to be reliant on food aid.
The scale of the economic collapse caused by the war is reflected in the numbers. The latest UN market data indicates that the food consumer price index is 102 percent higher than pre-war levels.
Shortage of Cash Liquidity
Palestinian economic expert Mohammed Abu Jiab said that one of the biggest challenges facing the Gaza economy was a shortage of cash liquidity. He explained that the availability of goods in markets in Gaza is not evidence of genuine economic activity, because purchasing power has sharply declined in the wake of thousands of families losing their jobs and savings as a result of the war.
Abu Jiab added that simply populating the markets with goods is not enough for the economy to recover. Instead, more income and job opportunities need to be created, allowing people to earn money that they can then spend on purchasing goods.
That is unlikely to happen without real long-term stability in Gaza, something that Israel appears unwilling to allow.
Every Decision is a Struggle
For Palestinians like Ghadeer, every decision at the store is a difficult one, and she is forced to only buy what she urgently needs. Her three-year-old daughter, Sham, recently wanted an orange after being treated for a broken leg. Ghadeer’s husband couldn’t afford to buy one, but the shopkeeper gave her one for free.
“There are many times when I cannot find anything to feed my children,” Ghadeer said. “I boil water with vegetable powder and they drink it without any vegetables or meat.”
“My biggest fear is that these may be my best days,” she added, “and that the worst is yet to come.”