Displaced Palestinian children look on as people evacuate the Mawassi area on the outskirts of southwestern Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip on June 28, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the militant Hamas group. - AFP
GAZA, June 30 (Bernama-Xinhua): Samia Ahmed, a Palestinian woman in Gaza, had to make a heartbreaking decision as the conflict continues to drag on.
In a devastated street in southern Gaza's Khan Younis city, she sold her precious golden ring to a jewellery dealer. The whole process took a few minutes, but the sting lingered on.
"It was the last legacy I have from my mother, who passed away years ago. I have never thought of getting rid of it, but my children are starving, and I need money to buy them a little food," Samia said.
"The conflict forces us to do everything to stay alive. Memories cannot save us from death or starvation," she added, reassuring herself that it was the right choice to make.
Eight months ago, Samia and her family were displaced from their house in Gaza City in northern Gaza and headed to Khan Younis beach to set up a temporary tent.
In March, an Israeli airstrike targeted a group of locals in a Khan Younis market. Samia's husband was in the market and lost his right leg in the attack. This devastating injury took away the family's primary source of income.
"Over these months, we are living in a catastrophe. All necessities for human beings to survive have become scarce here," Samia lamented.
Similar to Samia, Alia Amin, a 45-year-old mother of seven from Deir al-Balah, was also forced to sell her jewellery to buy a tent for her family who were forced to evacuate from the coastal Al-Mawasi area west of Rafah three days ago.
"We have to escape from one place to another just to survive," she told Xinhua, adding that her husband was killed by an Israeli airstrike in Rafah city four months ago. To survive the endless displacement, Alia had no choice but to sell her jewellery one by one.
"I have just sold the last piece of my jewellery," said Alia. "I do not know how I will cope when the money is used up."
Just like Samia and Alia, many women have resorted to selling their jewelleries to sustain their families. Zuheir, a Khan Younis-based jeweller who set up a stall to trade gold in the Al-Mawasi area, said because of the war, women were forced to sell their jewelleries at low prices.
"Every day, dozens of women come to sell their jewelleries to get some money," Zuheir said.
Before the conflict, each gramme of golden jewellery was sold for US$50, but now, it's only US$30, according to Zuheir. This amount can buy no more than two kilos of sugar in northern Gaza, based on the figures of a UN report in May.
The women in Gaza would soon be selling their last scraps of jewellery, and things are only going to get bleaker for them and their families, Zuheir warned. - Bernama-XInhua
