6:00 am Gaza time: The long road to aid that never comes

At six every morning, Samah Abu Naji and her husband Nizar Masoud leave the tent they made out of plastic sheeting in a corner of the Yemen Al-Saeed Hospital grounds in Jabalia camp, northern Gaza, heading to the aid distribution center at the Abu Rashid point 150 meters from where they are displaced. Each time, the same question crosses their minds: Will they return today with something to satiate their children’s hunger?

The couple quicken their steps toward the distribution point because, like most people in Gaza, they don’t have the luxury of despair. Even so, they are filled with betrayal, knowing that as usual they will gain nothing but the toil of the walk and will return without oil or flour.

“Every time my husband and I go to the distribution center they say: your name isn’t on the system,” says Samah, 31, who is five months pregnant and cares for two children in addition to her husband’s niece, who lost her father two years ago.

To no avail, the couple try to learn why their names are missing and plead to be added to the beneficiary lists for aid, which consists of a bag of flour and a food parcel containing canned goods, rice, and vegetable oil. At that point, they have no choice but to move to another queue in front of a nearby “tekiya,” a communal kitchen serving free meals, usually consisting of small amounts of rice, bulgur, lentils, or beans.

Even if they reach the front of the queue before the food runs out, they won’t manage to get more than a single dish, not enough to satisfy even one of the three children.

Samah and her husband’s daily ordeal encapsulates a larger crisis across the devastated Strip. A food parcel successfully reaching a family in northern Gaza doesn’t depend only on having their name listed among the beneficiaries.

From truck to distribution center

The crisis begins at the Gaza Strip border, where Israeli forces allow only small numbers of aid trucks lined up at the crossings to enter.

After that, the trucks begin a difficult journey, navigating dangerous roads before reaching the relief organizations’ warehouses. Then come the challenges of moving aid from warehouses to distribution centers, which themselves can break down. At the end of this journey, thousands of families compete for scarce aid that may be seized by unknown parties or halted for a range of reasons.

On July 12, the UN announced a halt to food distribution at the Abu Rashid point in Jabalia, in the northern Strip, after saying that armed individuals “affiliated with the de facto authorities” forcibly entered the center as well as a World Food Programme warehouse, and assaulted two drivers transporting humanitarian aid.

The parcel contains rice, cooking oil, salt, and some canned legumes, alongside a 25-kilogram sack of flour

The UN warned of an escalating pattern of what it described as interference, violence, and obstruction of humanitarian operations, including smuggling attempts, targeting humanitarian workers, and misuse of relief operations, emphasizing the need to protect workers and ensure unhindered aid access.

In response, the Government Media Office in Gaza rejected this narrative, saying in a statement published on its WhatsApp channel that what occurred was an operation conducted by Palestinian police after finding contraband inside some aid parcels, including cigarettes and mobile phone screens. It framed the intervention as a response to prior demands to secure relief convoys and prevent exploitation.

The office did not specify who was responsible for introducing the items, nor did it publish photos or evidence, though witnesses told Al Manassa that the items were found inside several aid boxes. Following the Government Media Office’s allegations and the initial UN statement, the World Food Programme issued no further response addressing the smuggling claims.

Regardless of the conflicting accounts, the dispute halted distribution for four days before it resumed, at a time when families are still waiting just to have their names added to beneficiary lists, while others depend on small quantities that fall short of their monthly needs.

Risky nutrition 

Nizar points out that distribution centers operate for only a few days a month, offering a parcel with rice, cooking oil, salt, and some canned legumes, alongside a 25-kilogram sack of flour—a quantity that doesn't last a family the full month.

Samah points to her eldest son, Majid, 9, sitting in a corner of the tent, scratching legs covered in inflamed, bleeding sores. “The clinic diagnosed him with an allergy to legumes, which make up a major portion of the food we get,” she says.

“Because the food relies on legumes, bumps showed up on his legs, and they spread more because of the contaminated tent environment and the mosquitoes and flies. The doctor at the clinic told me he needs antibiotics, a special ointment, and a bacterial culture. The ointment costs 40 shekels (around $15) and I don’t have that money. Even the tekiya food, which is all legumes, makes his allergy worse, but we’re forced to eat it; we live on whatever little aid comes,” Samah says.

The health problems are not limited to the family’s children. The mother, too, suffers from malnutrition and anemia, accompanied by frequent drops in blood pressure that sometimes lead to loss of consciousness.

When doctors advise her to eat iron-rich foods like meat, liver, and milk, she asks sarcastically: “Where would I get milk and meat from? Even the financial aid the international organizations promised us during awareness sessions a while back are just talk and promises without follow-through.”

Not on anyone’s list

A few meters from Samah’s tent, Mohammed Baalousha faces another side of the same crisis. The 36-year-old father lives in a small tent pitched over the rubble of his destroyed home to shelter him, his wife, and their three children.

Baalousha, who worked as a taxi driver before the war, spends most of his day searching for relief aid that he says never reaches him. Meanwhile, his daughter Taleen, under a year old, suffers from severe acute malnutrition, according to a diagnosis from UNRWA’s Jabalia clinic.

“They give her nutritional supplements, but she needs special formula we can’t afford to buy. We were relying on youth initiatives that provided formula for infants, but those stopped after funding dried up. We’re waiting for any alternative to save her body from ruin,” Baalousha tells Al Manassa.

He adds that he hasn’t received a single food basket in roughly five months, despite registering his name with multiple organizations, as scarce incoming quantities force thousands of families to compete over a limited number of parcels.

According to the latest data from the Gaza Government Media Office, issued on August 6, Israeli forces allowed 63,094 aid trucks to enter out of 180,000 trucks expected since the signing of the ceasefire agreement between Hamas and Israel in Sharm El-Sheikh on October 11, 2025—roughly a third of the required number.

Although data is unavailable regarding the number of families in northern Gaza or those unlisted on food parcel distribution rolls amid a web of relief programs and ongoing displacement, UN data shows a massive gap between needs and coverage.

Sixty-seven percent of the Gaza’s population faces crisis levels, or worse, of food insecurity, while the number of general food aid beneficiaries shifts drastically from month to month due to supply shortages, funding shortfalls, and restricted access. The UN notes that ongoing displacement and security and logistical constraints, particularly near Israeli military staging areas, complicate families’ access to services and aid.

Other living conditions compound the food crisis. The water reaching Baalousha’s area depends on a pump whose operation is threatened by fuel and oil shortages and dead batteries. His tent sits near Israeli army positioning zones east and north of Jabalia, where shelling and gunfire continue nearby.

A month ago, a missile landed meters from his tent, killing three people and injuring others, including two children whose feet were amputated, according to his testimony.

Dying on the way to the warehouse

The risks of aid delivery are not confined to displaced areas or distribution centers. The route taken by the trucks themselves carries danger for the workers driving them.

On July 8, World Central Kitchen announced the killing of a driver, Ahmed Nasser Salim, by the Israeli army while transporting aid from the Karm Abu Salem crossing to one of the organization’s warehouses inside the Gaza Strip. Salim worked for a logistics company partnered with World Central Kitchen.

Salim’s death was not an isolated incident. Israeli forces detained several truck drivers at the Karm Abu Salem crossing over the past month, a source in the Transport Association told Al Mansasa, speaking on condition of anonymity.

In another incident on July 20, an Israeli military vehicle targeted an escort car securing aid trucks along the coastal road between Rafah and Khan Younis in the southern Strip, killing three transport workers, according to the same source.

Thus, aid delivery does not bottleneck at a single, passable obstacle. Incoming quantities fall far short of need; transporting them puts drivers and crew in danger; distribution centers stall over disputed security incidents; and the journey ends with lists that exclude families and parcels that fail to sustain those who do receive them.

As for Samah, her routine is set. Tomorrow morning she will wake up and leave her tent, a hand resting on her stomach to shield her unborn child, on her way to the aid distribution center. She may well find her family’s name missing from the parcel lists, returning empty-handed only to move into the queue at the tekiya once more—not knowing if she can stand in line for hours, or if the food will last through everyone ahead of her, leaving a bit of rice, bulgur, lentils, or beans when her turn finally comes.