Gaza pre-war was a pretty densely packed urban area of 2.2 million people with limited open spaces outside the seafront. Gaza has to import basically everything it uses
They’ve been living under embargo for years where dual use military-civilian items are banned, which is a big list if you think about parallel uses
In ‘normal’ times life in Gaza for Palestinians was acceptable living standards, if impoverished and heavily dependent upon UN/NGO/charitable aid as a community
There was the Oct 7 surprise attack by Hamas and the following Israeli reaction since, leading us to right now and the ongoing war. The true number is unknown, but at present there have been over 26,000 civilians killed, and varying from 1 million to 500,000 were forced out of their homes by the war.
The northern half of Gaza is an active war zone, as are areas in the south & south east, resulting in large no-go zones for civilians
Many have gone to the refugee camps near the remaining border crossings, in the south, where the aid does still come in
Some choose to remain in the remaining undamaged and ruins of buildings, owing to massive overcrowding in refugee camps among the usual issues
To add to all this, there has been a reduction of aid coming into Gaza since the war started, ranging from completely being shut off from even water, reduced number of trucks carrying core basics, and currently it’s nowhere near enough.
No land for growing food to feed almost 2 million people, people who are largely displaced from their homes and supply, who at present are entirely reliant on outside assistance for survival. Severely insufficient supplies coming in from outside aid, poor medical availability for both war and normal injuries, illnesses and diseases - diseases that spread rapidly in dense areas like refugee camps.
If nothing changes, it’s going to be an incredible humanitarian crisis. How we, the global community act decides what happens to the Palestinians in Gaza. I hope we don’t repeat history.