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OPT: If you can't build,
bake - Humanitarian operations adapt to the realities of
the Gaza blockade
European Commission - Humanitarian Aid Office (ECHO)
3 June 2008
GAZA CITY - You need to be imaginative in Gaza
nowadays. Gazans learned this lesson a long time ago,
but today things are worse than ever, and creativity is
needed to keep going.
No imports, no exports, no jobs. The most common form of
transport is (skinny) donkeys. Since the borders of the
Strip were sealed, people have not been allowed to cross
to Egypt or Israel. Only basic commodities are let in by
the Israeli authorities: flour, sugar, oil, canned meat
and medicines. It's barely enough. Everything else is
either banned or prohibitively expensive. Cleaning
products are almost unobtainable in the rundown
groceries.
In effect, the market economy has collapsed. The private
sector has run out of business and work opportunities
for the most vulnerable, unskilled labourers have
vanished. The poor have become even poorer and families
no longer have breadwinners.
International agencies have stepped up their relief
efforts but here too, the price to pay in a closed
economy - if "economy" is the right word - is heavy.
Take, for example, a cash-for-work project financed by
the Humanitarian Aid department of the European
Commission and implemented by Mercy Corps. Up to few
months ago, unemployed labourers could earn a modest but
vital wage doing small-scale rehabilitation of schools,
parks and streets. But walls can't be built without
cement – and in Gaza, cement is no longer available. So
what to do? With a stroke of imagination, Mercy Corps
have adapted coming up with new solutions to keep their
project going. If people can't build, they can teach or
sew or bake instead.
In the new emergency job creation programme, different
categories of Palestinian, each supporting a large,
needy family, are doing different things. For example,
220 women have been selected to sew clothes for poor
children in Deir Al Balah and Khan Younis - although
clothing shortages are already putting this new activity
at risk.
Intellectual capacity can't be cut off so easily. Around
100 recent graduates have been contracted to teach
supplementary classes in Arabic, maths and English to
500 children with learning problems. The younger
generation is most affected by the crisis in the Gaza
Strip. The education system is under enormous pressure,
with double shifts operating in 85% of the schools.
Teachers report that many children have developed
aggressive behaviour and their concentration and
motivation levels have seriously decreased. The reality
of their daily life is very stressful. Children are
spending less time in school, and more and more on the
streets. There, many are the silent witnesses of
unpredictable violence that could affect their lives
forever. They see their fathers at home doing nothing.
And they are hungry.
Nutrition is a third component of the Mercy Corps
project, involving 4,000 children in 43 schools. Each
child receives a pastry fortified with vitamins and
minerals every day. About 80 women are involved in the
baking. "I never thought that one day I might become the
family breadwinner, but here I am taking pastries out of
the oven," says Amal Al Masri who has a seven children
of her own to feed. The family has fallen below the
"subsistence line". In plain terms, they are trying to
survive on around one Euro a day. They have already sold
whatever they could - the car, the furniture, the
bracelet that had been a wedding gift. There is nothing
left to sell, and even if there were, no-one around has
money to spend.
Other coping mechanisms have been developed by a
population now heavily dependent on external
humanitarian assistance. Children drop out of school
early: girls to get married and leave the family home,
boys to go scavenging in the streets, searching for
anything that might generate some income. Family meals
have been reduced, from three to two, from two to one.
"In the summer, my children were pleading to go to the
beach," said Amal. "My husband had to refuse because
there was no money to get there, even by donkey." Amal
is not a refugee. She was born in Gaza and has always
lived there. When work was available, she told us, life
was difficult but not unbearable. Things started to get
seriously worse after the second Intifada, when
Palestinian workers were no longer allowed to cross into
Israel for work. "That's when my husband lost his job.
After that, my family and neighbours helped us a lot and
we made it through somehow. But today, people can't help
each other any more. Our solidarity network has gone. In
Gaza we cannot trade, farm, fish or build. With the
power cuts, we spend long hours in the dark. The water
is running at the moment but you can't rely on it. What
do you expect us to do?"
Humanitarian aid is about keeping people alive and
limiting suffering as far as possible until the politics
can be sorted out. Viewed from the desolation of the
Gaza Strip, a long-term solution seems far beyond reach,
but even sporadic injections of cash offer some relief
to struggling families. Amal knows what she will do with
the money she earns as a temporary baker. "I'll pay off
some of my debts with the grocery store. Then I'll buy
shoes for the kids. And finally, I'll try to get some
painkillers for my husband's back."
Daniela Cavini
ECHO Regional Information Officer, Amman
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