The Electronic Intifada 4 August 2025
A man carries aid secured from a “Gaza Humanitarian Foundation” aid distribution point on 16 June.
APA imagesOn 10 June, Yehya Nahed Yehya, 17, was waiting to receive aid at a Netzarim aid distribution center run by the Israeli-US Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) when the Israeli military bombed a nearby warehouse called al-Daawa.
Panic ensued, Yehya told The Electronic Intifada. People – he said he remembered there must have been thousands at the time – started running, torn between chancing to wait for possible aid and seeking safety.
“The shooting and bombing never stopped,” Yehya said.
Several people, he said, were killed and wounded.
This was an attack on aid seekers that has become a routine since the Israeli-US Gaza Humanitarian Foundation began operating in late May.
Since then, more than 1,000 desperate and starving people have been killed running the gauntlet at these GHF aid distribution centers – a process Palestinians in Gaza compare to Squid Game, the dystopian South Korean TV show in which desperate people risk their lives for money in a series of children’s games.
With Israel maintaining full control over all that enters or leaves Gaza, people in Gaza have only two perilous ways to access aid.
The first is by going directly to one of four GHF distribution points.
The second option is to intercept aid convoys en route to these distribution points as they drive through military-only zones in Gaza.
Yehya tried the GHF route, but recounted several times when the Israeli military – using helicopters, quadcopter drones or tanks – shot or targeted people waiting for aid, including the aforementioned bombing in June.
And to compound matters, most people who put their lives at risk, do it for nothing.
“I went to Netzarim ten times but returned empty-handed every time,” Yehya told The Electronic Intifada.
He explained that Palestinians are confined to certain areas in the vicinity of these distribution points under pain of death.
“By Netzarim, there is a red line that nobody must cross or they will be killed,” Yehya said. “That red line is near Al-Wadi bridge.”
That doesn’t stop the military from killing people anyway, he said, even on the Bureij roundabout, a significant distance away.
Gambling with your life
With a deliberate Israeli-imposed famine firmly entrenched in Gaza – and widespread starvation that has already claimed the lives of more than 160 people so far, though this is likely a huge underestimate – people in Gaza have very little option.
The day before the bombing at the warehouse, on 9 June, Yehya and his family – parents and three siblings – had been forced to leave Jabaliya after the Israeli military dropped leaflets warning them to evacuate.The family relocated to Deir al-Balah – their fourth displacement since October 2023.
His father is an employee of the Palestinian Authority and still gets a salary. But with the price of food astronomical – before Israel’s genocide, a kilo of sugar cost $1. Now it is $100 – even with a salary, it is not enough to survive.
Thus on 10 June, Yehya steeled himself to get aid at the Netzarim crossing where he had learned from the GHF social media page that the distribution point would open at 6 am the following day.
“I reached al-Bureij roundabout around midnight and the shooting had already begun,” Yehya said. “When we went forward to the distribution point, the occupation forces shot at us.”
But even those who held out – and survived – were ultimately disappointed.
“The amount of food the occupation put into the distributing points was also not enough for the people. Very few people returned with aid,” Yehya clarified.
Despairing of Netzarim, Yehya decided to venture back north to Beit Lahiya on 15 June, where he had heard that more trucks with aid were entering. Others had heard the same thing, and the dangerous Salah al-Din Street was crowded with hungry aid seekers.
“I managed to return with a bag of flour weighing 25 kilograms,” Yehya said. “I consider myself very lucky to return with this prize that now costs around $700.”
Before October 2023, a similar quantity would fetch no more than $30.
Food not money
Abdulkareem Ahmed Hijab, 38, is a displaced father of seven children.
At the beginning of this genocide, Abdulkareem and his family evacuated from Bureij refugee camp to a tent in Deir al-Balah.
Like Yehya’s father, Abdulkareem also relies on a salary from the Palestinian Authority, for whom he was a young security guard back in 2007. But as the prices rose, it was not enough to afford food for his family.
“I went to Netzarim four times and I was lucky to get something once,” he told The Electronic Intifada. “You either return with something in your hand, or you return in people’s hands, as a martyr or injured.”
And even when you are successful, Abdulkareem added, “the food from Netzarim is mixed with blood.”
Every time Abdulkareem went to the GHF distribution point at Netzarim, he saw killings.
“There is shooting everywhere from drones and tanks. Every day there are martyrs left on the ground and no one to collect them,” he said.
Those who are not killed are desperate and hungry.
“People do not care about their lives anymore. Although they may be killed, people will go anywhere to find food.”
Abdulkareem walked from Deir al-Balah to the Netzarim distribution point whenever he could. He did not go to any of the Rafah distribution points because he couldn’t afford the cost of transport.
There are four GHF distribution points in Gaza, two in Rafah in the south and one in Khan Younis, in addition to Netzarim.
The one time he managed to get supplies at Netzarim was on 8 June, after getting to the distribution point at dawn to await the 6 am opening.
On the way back, Abdulkareem gave one kilogram of his flour to a driver to get back to Deir al-Balah.
“There is no transportation at all, so if you find a car, the driver will take some of the food you brought instead of the money,” Abdulkareem said.
Crushed bodies
Shehab Mohammed Hajaj, 23, was displaced to a tent in Deir al-Balah with his parents and six siblings after the Israeli military bombed their home – in another part of Deir al-Balah – during the first week of Israel’s genocide in October 2023.
Before the genocide started, Shehab worked in a supermarket.
After he and his family were displaced, Shehab had to work to support them, so he built a stall to sell toys and stationery on al-Nakheel Street in Deir al-Balah.
But he, like everyone else in Gaza, is starved. So when he heard that trucks would come on Salah al-Din Street, Shehab ran from his tent.
The Israeli military will sometimes route aid trucks through designated military zones in Gaza to reach distribution points.
“I ran with my neighbour to get flour,” Shehab told The Electronic Intifada. “We didn’t find anything. The trucks were empty and some thieves were shooting at the people to keep them away.”
Shehab did not give up, however. He was determined to bring flour for his family as they did not have any. So he went to eastern Salah Al-Din Street near Kissufim, an Israeli colony near the central part of the Gaza Strip, where he knew trucks entered Gaza.
“When I entered the area, I saw two bodies crushed under a truck,” Shehab said.
The area near Kissufim is a no-go military zone where the Israeli army will target anything that moves without warning. But Shehab had run out of options — it had been two weeks since his family had even had a loaf of bread.
He got to the area, he said, at around 6 pm. It was after midnight when he came home, empty-handed.
“I returned at 12:30 with nothing but some pieces of wood for the fire, and blood on my leg because of the unpaved road.”
“Everything is extremely expensive,” Shehab said, though he did manage to secure half a bag of flour under an agreement with his neighbor that whoever managed to secure any aid would share with the other.
Shehab’s younger brother, 17, who Shehab did not want to name, had gone to the Netzarim distribution center, but instead of food, he returned in shock.
“My brother went to get food, but he found only Israeli soldiers killing people, and thieves who would steal from anyone who had secured aid.”
The Israeli military specifically built the distribution points in Rafah and Netzarim because they are isolated and away from inhabited areas.
“Every day there are martyrs and injuries,” Shehab said. “Women, the elderly and children. People are being killed for a parcel of food.”
Khaled Al-Qershali is an English graduate working as a journalist in Gaza.
