we are not numbers
emerging writers from Palestine tell their stories and advocate for their human rights
In Netzarim, Khan Younis, and Rafah, the U.S.–Israeli run aid stations are not humanitarian, they are death traps.
Omar Abd Rabbo, who was hospitalized after being shot in the stomach while seeking aid from the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation distribution site in Khan Younis on July 2, 2025. Photo: Obada Abu Gola
In Gaza, under the weight of need that has shattered our dignity, our feet were driven to the aid distribution points managed by the so-called Gaza Humanitarian Foundation in Netzarim, Rafah, and Khan Younis, with the faint hope that we would return with enough to feed ourselves. We were not ignorant of the danger. We saw it and memorized its features: an airplane flies, a sniper lurks, a shell falls, a martyr is carried away.
But when hunger intensifies, it silences fear and overrides dignity. We go, not because we have forgotten either of those two things, but because we have been starved.
I was at Netzarim. I watched the crowds rush like a raging wave into an enclosed space, where a few packages were thrown in like crumbs to hungry birds. No organization, no safety, no mercy. The scene was akin to the lowest level of hell: bodies crushed, heads exploding, youths run over, children lost.
Screams mingled with tank smoke and bullets rang out above the moans of the hungry. This was not a scramble for food, but a collective fall into the abyss of lost identity.
The massive crowds seeking aid at the GHF distribution site in Netzarim on June 26. Screenshot from video taken by Obada Abu Gola
In Khan Younis, the story was repeated with a bloodier chapter. A single distribution point for tens of thousands of families, in an open area with no trees or cover. As soon as the crowds began to gather, the first shell landed. Screams, blood, bodies, mothers running, children hiding behind bags of flour. Hunger was not our only enemy here, but also treachery.
Omar Abd Rabbo, upper right, shortly before he was shot while seeking aid in Khan Younis. Screenshot from video taken by Obada Abu Gola
With every distribution announcement, Rafah becomes a daily game of death. Every announcement about the distribution of aid means new danger. But people go… because the alternative is deadly hunger.
But even before reaching the place where the food is located—while waiting for the gates to open—people are bombarded and shot at directly. Shot even before reaching the food; many are martyred.
And there are still dozens of people who don’t return. They are missing, and we don’t know their fate. Did they die or were they imprisoned? We don’t know what happened to them.
Going to get humanitarian aid means participating in a real-life version of “Squid Game.” There is an announcement, then a gathering, then a long wait under the watchful eyes of snipers and under the unblinking eyes of drones.
Whoever arrives first may get a bag of flour, and whoever is late may be run over, sniped, or return with the body of a loved one. It is a deadly competition, with no rules, no safety, no humanity. We don’t go to live; we play a game of life and death in order to survive another day. In this game, no one wins… Everyone loses, even the survivors.
“We waited for hours under the sun, waiting for the moment of opening,” Omar Abd Rabbo told me. On July 2, 2025, he and my brother Obada, his friend, ventured to the Netzarim aid station together. “As soon as the gate opened, we ran with all our hunger, fear, and hope. We weren’t just looking for food, we were running towards life.
“But halfway through, the scene changed: shots from all sides and artillery shelling surrounded us,” he added.“We sat on the ground, looking left and right for something to take cover with: a stone, a wall, even a piece of iron… There was nothing. We saw death with our own eyes, and it came so close to us that we almost said goodbye to our souls. We thought we weren’t coming back. We were sure we would die under the showers of bullets. But God saved us, miraculously. We survived.
“Since that day, I have come to believe that whoever goes for aid in Gaza, either comes back with a full bag… or he comes back with a sack full, a soulless corpse.”
What’s worse is that many of the parcels never reach their intended recipients. Crisis merchants infiltrate the masses, catching aid and selling it at unimaginable prices in the hunger market. Parcels are looted, not distributed. People fight rather than share. Dignity is trampled underfoot, in a scene that screams: Are we still human beings?
What is happening in Gaza today is not relief but a bloody hoax. The aid that is allowed in is scant, degrading, and dumped in open spaces to become death traps. They are death traps in which the hand of occupation is unleashed by bombing and the hand of humiliation is unleashed by exploitation of our desperate hunger. Ironically, some world leaders—led by the United States—boast that they are providing aid. But they do not care that life for us has been reduced to a shawl of flour mixed with blood.
This scene will not be understood by watching the news. It can only be appreciated by those who have experienced hunger, walked in lines under airplanes, heard the sound of a missile while holding an “aid” card. In Gaza, we choose every day: the bullet of hunger or the missile of relief. The world sees the queues and bags of aid, but not the internal displacement, the repeated forced moves, the trauma of choosing between dignity and survival.
This is not just about food—it is about life forcibly torn from its place.
