GAZA, Dec. 5 (Xinhua) -- Noha Saleem, a 49-year-old Palestinian woman living in Gaza, is trying to buy some second-hand clothes to keep her children warm as the cold weather hits the coastal enclave, which has been mired in a bloody conflict with Israel since Oct. 7.
Saleem and her nine-member family were forced to leave their homes under the Israeli army's evacuation order 40 days ago, having no chance to take any of their belongings or money that could support their living.
"The weather was still warm when we left our houses, and we had no idea at the time that our suffering would last for such a long time," she said.
The staggering prices of new clothes in central Gaza's Deir al-Balah city are unaffordable for Saleem.
"I tried for several days ... but I do not have enough money," she said with teary eyes. "This is why I resorted to buying second-hand clothes to warm my children and even myself."
However, finding suitable second-hand clothes was not easy, and she had to sit in front of piles of used clothes to choose the best ones.
Nowadays, it has been extremely difficult for the people residing in the Gaza Strip to afford new clothing. Instead, their primary concern is to buy food and drinks with the money they have left.
"The high cost and the scarcity of new winter clothes in the markets, plus the difficult economic conditions, have pushed people to go for used clothes," Mohammed Farjallah, a displaced man in Gaza, told Xinhua.
In a situation similar to that of Saleem, the 45-year-old father of six left his house in Gaza City and headed for Rafah without taking any money, not to mention winter clothes.
"We only wanted to save ourselves from the Israeli bombardment when we left our houses," he said. "But later, we found that everything in our life has been turned upside down."
At the beginning, "we were struggling to find safe accommodations, some food, and other basic needs. Now, we are struggling to find some clothes for our kids to keep them warm, but we cannot afford the new ones as we've lost our jobs and have no incomes," he said. "I hope we would wake up from the current nightmare."
Shady Kamal, an employee for the Palestinian Authority (PA), has not received his monthly salaries since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas conflict on Oct. 7.
The 49-year-old father of five is now living in the al-Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza after losing his house in an Israeli airstrike two weeks ago.
The unprecedented payment delay has further plunged Kamal's family into difficulty. "We left without anything that would help us live normally," he said.
Recently, Kamal, as well as other PA's employees, received 50 percent of his payment as a financial aid for the first time in two months.
"Such an amount of money can only allow me to buy the used clothes, as I need to buy some food first for my children," he said. "The price of used clothes is less than one U.S. dollar, which is accessible to us."
According to the Palestinian Ministry of Finance, Israel has cut Gaza funds by about 161 million dollars from Palestinian tax transfer, which is used for salaries, employee allocations, among other expenses in the Gaza Strip.
The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics estimated that the poverty rate in the enclave is to reach about 90 percent, the unemployment to reach about 65 percent, and the inflation rate to reach about 12 percent due to the ongoing conflict. ■
