As Israel bombards Gaza, food and water runs low

STORY: Men and children, desperate for food, leaned into a bakery in Gaza.

As an Israeli bombardment intensified on Saturday (October 14), drinking water was also in short supply.

And power shortages left families without charged phones to find out if fleeing relatives were safe.

This Gazan in Khan Younis has been visiting a neighbor – who has solar power – to charge his phone.

“It’s like going back to prior 1948, even before that, we’ve gone back to the stone age, no electricity, water, internet, nor fuel, those who have generators that operate on fuel to provide power is pointless, there is no fuel, nor diesel, nor anything else, it is terrifying, look at that, how many phones, that are being charged, it is frightening.”

More than 1 million Palestinians in northern Gaza faced an Israeli deadline on Saturday (October 14) to flee south. And Khan Younis, in south Gaza, is filling up fast.

The flood of people arriving in the south has stretched resources that were already strained to a breaking point.

Many displaced Gazans took refuge in this school west of Khan Younis.

Naeem Abu Eid is one of them. He said the family felt danger was getting closer to them when they were near the Israeli border.

An Israeli military spokesman said troops were massing around the Gaza Strip, “getting ready for the next stage of operations” … after having already launched raids into the enclave.

Israel has vowed to annihilate the Hamas militant group that controls Gaza in retaliation for a rampage by fighters, who stormed through Israeli towns a week ago, gunning civilians down and taking off with scores of hostages. Some 1,300 people were killed in the worst attack on civilians in Israel’s history.

The United Nations has urged Israel to “avert a humanitarian catastrophe” in Gaza, a slither of land with 2.3 million people.