Gaza's Daily Struggle: Power, Water, and Medical Supplies Scarce Post-Ceasefire

On a dusty roadside in west Gaza City, Jihad Qasim tunes out the ceaseless rattle of the passing traffic and focuses on his clientele.

There's the kerbside consultation: "You want to grow it?" he asks one young customer. "Let it grow so we can do a curly hairstyle?"

And for an older client, empathy: "You go to work, and come back empty-handed," he agrees.

Mr Qasim loses himself in his work, singing quietly as he skims his trimmer across a client's head, before he returns to one of Gaza's many problems.

"You know, the electricity today is so expensive," he notes.

Twenty-eight shekels is about $14, which must be paid to private generator owners, or his trimmers can't be charged.

"If the electricity is there, you can work, finish, cut, but when it goes, you just stop."

Almost eight months after a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas ended major hostilities in Gaza, although low-level conflict grinds on, daily life for the strip's 2.1 million residents is governed by the unpredictability of the essentials: power, water and food.

Nothing comes easy.

Water pumped in from Israel runs through a network of damaged pipes and is unsafe to drink, or often, to wash with.

It's known as "Mekorot" — the name of Israel's national water company.

"It's not good water," Mr Qasim says.

His customer in the barber's chair agrees.

The water crisis

In December, Israel banned 37 international NGOs from operating in Gaza.

Those that remain, including Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) and Mercy Corps, spend a great deal of time and money treating water so it is safe to drink.

The NGO delivers millions of litres of water inside Gaza.

Mr Kenzie says new machinery and many of the materials used to repair the treatment plants are blocked from entering Gaza.

"So these are things we've had to kind of Frankenstein together by salvaging parts to make sure that we still end up having water provided for the people," he says.

"Those all run on generator electricity, as well as a whole fleet of water trucks to distribute it across Gaza."

Israel restricts the entry into Gaza of earthmoving equipment to clear rubble, generators, engine oil, and any building material considered "dual use".

These "dual-use" items include the essential materials for rebuilding in Gaza, like plastic pipes and engine oil to lubricate machinery such as generators.

Without pipes, fixing water plants and infrastructure damaged in two years of war is impossible.

"But that is really not possible at this time due to the restrictions that have been placed on the items that can be brought in to repair systems."

Medical supplies running short

Restrictions on supplies and international staff are also affecting medical care provided by groups such as MSF.

"We've been trying to continue to run our operations with those teams that we have on the ground and the limited supplies that remain," says Mr Kenzie.

MSF operates temporary field hospitals and a 50-bed paediatric ward in Al-Rantisi hospital.

"We're going into a very precarious situation now where we're having major ruptures on a lot of the drugs that we did have, particularly ones for non-communicable diseases such as hypertension, diabetes and so forth," says Mr Kenzie.

"But right around that corner, there's lots of concerns about the dressing materials for the wounds that we're getting.

"And we've even been looking at whether or not we've had to reduce the number of beds that we operate in the paediatric hospital just because we're worried about not being able to get any supplies in."

The stalled rebuild

Under the terms of the October ceasefire, Israel would withdraw progressively towards its border and allow more aid and commercial supplies into the territory, while Hamas disarmed. Foreign aid money would eventually flow in to pay for rebuilding.

It's an arrangement "based on reciprocity," says Nickolay Mladenov, the high envoy on Donald Trump's Board of Peace, which is overseeing the ceasefire and eventual rebuilding of Gaza.

That arrangement has stalled.

Israel has withdrawn its troops to a "yellow line", a shifting border marked by yellow concrete blocks that bisects Gaza from north to south, while Hamas has not disarmed.

Both sides say the other is not sticking to the terms of the ceasefire.

However, the amount of food aid coming into Gaza has increased.

The World Food Program says for the first time since the beginning of the war, it is delivering a full ration of two wheat flour bags and two food boxes to more than 1 million people in Gaza, each month.

But commercial supplies are still restricted, and that means prices on the street are high.

Mr Qasim's bricks-and-mortar barber shop was destroyed in the war, so he had to buy a tent, mirror, barber's chair and a bed to sleep in.

"Everything is expensive," he says.

Mr Qasim buys essential business supplies for his barber shop, like shampoo and soap, at a nearby store.

Cash is scarce, so almost all payments in Gaza are made via internet transfers on the Bank of Palestine App.

It works only when there's an internet signal.

Air strikes and shelling continue sporadically, with more than 900 Palestinians killed since the ceasefire began last October.

There's a risk that the impasse becomes permanent, says Mr Mladenov.

"If Hamas and Israel prefer the status quo, work with me on this," he said at a press briefing last week.

"A status quo actually means at some point solidifying the Yellow Line probably into a fence, probably into a wall, creating a permanent separation in Gaza.

The life Gazans have today

Most buildings in Gaza are uninhabitable. Debris removal, let alone rebuilding, has barely begun.

A joint EU/World Bank/UN report says three-quarters of all housing in Gaza, totalling 371,888 homes, have been damaged, and 84.6 per cent of those have been destroyed.

The UN estimates that there is around 61 million tonnes of debris in Gaza that needs clearing — but so far, less than 1 per cent has been removed.

The UN says that is because of the severe restrictions on parts and engine oil needed for earthmoving equipment.

Mr Mladenov says $US17 billion ($24 billion) in foreign aid has been earmarked for Gaza, but won't be unlocked while the threat of Hamas re-arming remains.

"Every donor will tell you, we invest in this situation and we have a couple of years before whatever we invested in is destroyed again," he says.

The UN says about 1.5 million of Gaza's 2.1 million residents live in tents or temporary shelters.

That includes Mr Qasim, who works, cooks and sleeps in his roadside barber shop, which is built of canvas and plastic.

His workday ends as the light fades, and the power is turned off.

"We sleep here," says Mr Qasim, gesturing at his makeshift shelter, with its cracked mirror and wobbly barber's chair.