In Gaza, fire no longer symbolises warmth or comfort — it has become the last means of survival. Families, stripped of basic necessities by the Israeli blockade, are burning the remnants of their shattered homes just to cook a meal. With cooking gas completely cut off since October 2023, thousands now rely on wood scraps, plastic, and broken furniture as fuel — toxic materials that fill homes with black smoke and despair.
The rare glimmer of relief during a short ceasefire in early 2024 has long since faded. Since the truce collapsed in March, residents have had no access to cooking gas. What remains is a daily battle for survival. Parents now tear apart what little is left — beds, cupboards, doors — not out of anger, but out of hunger.
“I used to build furniture,” says Mohammad Mousa, a displaced father of six. “Now I burn mine to feed my children.” His story mirrors thousands of others in Gaza. Wood has become more expensive than food, and desperation drives families to burn plastic and rubbish, choking on the very smoke that keeps them alive.
The consequences are not only economic but deeply human. Children are falling ill. Lungs are filling with fumes. Hope is eroding. “We’re suffocating in our own homes,” says Kamal Obeid, whose youngest child now suffers from chronic coughs. “This is not life. This is survival under siege.”
In neighbourhoods reduced to rubble, families like Mouin Abd Al-Al’s gather splinters of wood from bombed-out buildings to cook a pot of lentils. “We are making fire from the bones of our lives,” he says.
As the air grows thicker with smoke and sorrow, Gaza is sending a message to the world: not one of politics, but of pain. “We’re not asking for much,” one mother pleads. “Just let us feed our children without setting our homes on fire.”
Source : Safa News
