A 28-year-old mother of three children younger than 10, from Jabalya Refugee Camp
My husband Salem (37) and I got married 10 years ago, and we have three children: Muhammad (9), Zeinah (7), and Zinat (2). We have been renting since we got married, and currently pay NIS 550 a month (NIS 1 = USD 0.27).
My husband had always worked in restaurants and as a security guard in residential buildings, but he hasn’t been able to find work as a security guard for five years, so he opened a stall selling vegetables and children’s clothing. Unfortunately, the income from the stall is not enough to cover our expenses, and he hasn’t been able to find a permanent job yet. I worked for a year in daycare centers and also cleaning houses every day from 6:00 A.M. to 9:00 P.M. I made NIS 600 a month, but it wasn’t a permanent job, and it didn’t help our financial situation much either.
My husband has had to sell products we received from UNRWA to cover the rent and pay off our debts. The financial pressures exhaust us and make us fight.
Sometimes, when there is a flour shortage on the market or when the power cuts off again and again in one day, I get worried that the business will fail, and it really brings me down. We follow the power supply table on the power company’s website and plan the work around it, but sometimes the dough still spoils because of blackouts, and it’s very frustrating.
In 2018, I decided to open a home bakery that specializes in home-style pita bread. We didn’t have baking equipment at home or enough money to buy raw materials that would be enough for a project like this, so I borrowed baking equipment and flour from my family. I also opened a Facebook page called ‘Khubuz Darna’ [Arabic for our home bread] and advertised the bakery on it. My husband and I started baking together. At first, we baked about a hundred pitas a day and sold 12 pitas for NIS 1. We got a lot of inquiries from people on Facebook. After we started making some money, my husband started buying sacks of flour for NIS 50 per 30 kg, and we also raised the price of 12 pitas to NIS 2.
It’s been five years since the bakery opened. I bake 350 pitas almost every day. People have started buying bags of flour and sending them to me so that I can make them a certain quantity of pita bread. Sometimes, when there is a flour shortage on the market or when the power cuts off again and again in one day, I get worried that the business will fail, and it really brings me down. We follow the power supply table on the power company’s website and plan the work around it, but sometimes the dough still spoils because of blackouts, and it’s very frustrating.
We go on baking anyway because baking enables us to support the family without needing help from anyone. We do everything by hand and do not use electric kneading tools or other electrical devices. There is a generator here in the camp that you can connect to for a fee of NIS 4 per kilowatt, but we can’t afford it, so we rely on the municipal electricity supply exclusively. The work is very hard and sometimes causes us pains and aches. We don’t have an oven, and we bake the pitas in three electric baking pots. Some nights I hardly sleep, so I can take advantage of the power at night to have pitas to sell to customers in the morning.
The profits from the baking mainly cover our rent, and to make some extra money, my husband also cycles around Gaza City selling pitas.
In winter, water leaks through the tin roof of our house. I dream of having my own house with a concrete roof. I also dream of having normal furniture so we can sit comfortably. I’d like my children to have furniture that suits them too. We have a refrigerator and a washing machine at home, but I dream of having an electric oven, a fan and maybe a TV. I also dream of being able to buy kneading tools and more advanced baking equipment for the business.
I hope my children never miss a meal. We only eat chicken on Friday, and I thank God for that too.
We can’t afford to take the kids to playgrounds that cost money or buy them toys. Sometimes when I walk down the street with Zeina, she points to toys she sees in shop windows, and I tell her it’s not possible now and that I’ll buy her toys when she has her own room. I dream of having enough money to give the children pocket money and to be able to pay for their studies in the future.
* Testimony given to B'Tselem Field Researcher Olfat al-Kurd on 3 March 2023.