JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
A U.N.-backed report on hunger warns that half a million people in Gaza are facing starvation due to Israel's expanding war and its restrictions on aid. Experts describe this level of hunger as catastrophic and where famine can set in. NPR's Anas Baba in Gaza met with one of these families that is running out of ways to cope. NPR's Aya Batrawy in Dubai brings us this report.
HASSAN AL-ZANEEN: (Non-English language spoken).
AYA BATRAWY, BYLINE: That's Hassan al-Zaneen, 5 years old. He's the youngest of eight kids in the family and the only boy. He's spoiled with love and makes his older sisters laugh.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: (Non-English language spoken).
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: (Non-English language spoken).
(LAUGHTER)
BATRAWY: The matriarch of this family is 39-year-old Mahasin al-Zaneen. She tells Hassan he shouldn't keep talking about how hungry he feels.
MAHASIN AL-ZANEEN: (Non-English language spoken).
HASSAN: (Non-English language spoken).
M AL-ZANEEN: (Non-English language spoken).
BATRAWY: Her husband, a school principal, died from COVID-19 in 2021. It was hard then, but she had a roof over her head and work. She trained teachers and once ran in local elections as an independent, one of the first women in Gaza to do so. She describes herself like this...
M AL-ZANEEN: (Non-English language spoken).
BATRAWY: ...As a burning candle that lights the way for others. NPR's producer Anas Baba met al-Zaneen, who also goes by Umm Hassan, and her children in their tent in Gaza City. They introduce themselves.
M AL-ZANEEN: Umm Hassan.
RANA: Rana.
RUBA: Ruba (ph).
AYA: Aya (ph).
ASIR: Asir (ph).
HALA: Hala (ph).
RAD: Rad (ph).
BATOOL: Batool (ph).
HASSAN: Hassan.
BATRAWY: They've been displaced 10 times in nearly 20 months of war. Their home in the north is a pile of rubble, destroyed in an Israeli airstrike.
(SOUNDBITE OF EXPLOSION)
BATRAWY: Even in their tent now, an Israeli drone buzzes overhead, and Israeli tank shelling is heard in the distance. To feed her eight kids, al-Zaneen has leaned on friends and relatives for money, but they too are struggling to survive.
M AL-ZANEEN: (Non-English language spoken).
BATRAWY: So about a month ago, she turned to her 70-year-old mother. She gave al-Zaneen her gold wedding band to sell. It bought them food to last a few days. Markets have dried up and aid warehouses are empty after what had been weeks of Israeli blockade. Despite some U.N. aid that's entered in recent weeks, no food has reached Gaza City. It's been taken off trucks by hungry crowds in other parts of Gaza. A U.N.-backed report by dozens of experts says 1 in 5 people in Gaza now face catastrophic hunger, and the territory is at risk of famine. Al-Zaneen says her family is starving.
M AL-ZANEEN: (Non-English language spoken).
BATRAWY: She says they resorted to eating the leaves of berries and trees.
M AL-ZANEEN: (Laughter, non-English language spoken).
BATRAWY: She laughs at how maddening it is but says it's the reality. Between the rows of makeshift tents in Gaza City where the family lives, her daughters grow basil in the dirt. Sometimes, charities pass by, handing out bread. They wrap the basil in it.
M AL-ZANEEN: (Non-English language spoken).
BATRAWY: Her daughters feel dizzy. They faint. One daughter lost teeth because she doesn't have enough calcium. Her eldest daughter, Rana, a 20-year-old medical student before the war, weighs under 90 pounds. Rana's role in the family last year was getting bread from overcrowded bakeries, where she saw a woman and two girls crushed to death in a crowd.
RANA: (Non-English language spoken).
BATRAWY: She says it was famine then but not like this. Now there aren't even bakeries. Hunger is ravaging the family.
M AL-ZANEEN: (Non-English language spoken).
BATRAWY: Al-Zaneen says, hunger is grief. It is loss of control. It's all consuming, she says. The family wakes up and goes to sleep hungry.
M AL-ZANEEN: (Non-English language spoken).
BATRAWY: When lunch is available, they eat lentils - boiled, plain and provided by a charity kitchen. And many have shut down because they've run out of food. Israel says its aid restrictions are aimed at pressuring Hamas, which still holds Israeli hostages. Israel's new aid distribution system, run by American contractors, has been chaotic and plagued by deadly shootings.
Al-Zaneen says her little boy worries about dying of hunger. He wants eggs and milk. She takes him to the market to show him there is none. And on days when there's not even lentils, she says her girls just drink water from a truck that comes by the tents every morning.
M AL-ZANEEN: (Non-English language spoken).
BATRAWY: Water for breakfast, lentils for lunch - some days, water for dinner. This, she says, is their life. Aya Batrawy, NPR News, Dubai, with Anas Baba in Gaza City. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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