Naim Abu Amra’s land in central Gaza’s Deir al-Balah used to be covered with greenhouses.
On the 11-dunam (one hectare) stretch of land east of Abu Holi, the Palestinian farmer grew tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers and courgettes, with some seasonal rotations of eggplants and leafy vegetables to keep the soil healthy.
Like many of Gaza’s farmers, Abu Amra was working with limited means due to tight Israeli restrictions on agricultural imports, and had to be resourceful, using drip-irrigation systems powered by solar panels and a small diesel pump.
His produce was sold in local markets, sustaining a family of eight and providing work to seasonal labourers during the peak months.
But after Israel’s genocidal war began in October 2023, everything changed. The entire area was declared a “no-go zone”. His greenhouses were destroyed, irrigation pipes torn apart and the well filled with sand and debris.
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“Military bulldozers levelled the land to bare soil; even the plastic and metal structures melted under the bombing,” Abu Amra told Middle East Eye.
His once-thriving fields were left unusable, covered in rubble and littered with unexploded ordnance.
Still, he was determined to bring life back to the land. With the help of his sons, he cleared debris using shovels and donkeys, and managed to plant small patches of okra and molokhia using collected rainwater.
‘The war didn’t just take our crops. It took our future’
– Naim Abu Amra, Gaza farmer
The destruction, he said, wiped out not only his family’s sole source of income but also their sense of purpose.
“The psychological toll is heavy. Seeing land that once fed hundreds reduced to ashes is devastating,” Abu Amra said.
“My children, who used to help me harvest, now ask if we will ever see our greenhouses again. The war didn’t just take our crops. It took our future.”
The two-year onslaught has rendered over 95 percent of Gaza’s agricultural land inaccessible, according to a joint assessment in July by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the United Nations Satellite Centre (UNOSAT).
The data revealed that, as of May, 80 percent of Gaza’s cropland was damaged, while 77.8 percent of that land is now inaccessible to farmers.
But the damage extends across the entire sector, with 71.2 percent of greenhouses and 82.8 percent of water wells impacted.
The FAO warned that the destruction signifies the “collapse of Gaza’s agrifood system and lifelines”.
‘Deliberate and carefully planned’
Prior to October 2023, Gaza’s agriculture accounted for 11 percent of its GDP, providing livelihoods for some 560,000 people.
Now the contribution is reduced to under two percent, according to Bahaa Zaqout, the director of external relations at the Palestinian Agricultural Development Association (PARC).
“The sector is almost wiped out. The destruction was deliberate and carefully planned,” Zaqout told MEE.
Israel has long weaponised Gaza’s food system by exerting tight controls on the entry of equipment, fertilisers and even seeds into the territory. But since October 2023, it has been pursuing a policy of eradicating the sector entirely.
According to World Bank estimates, the process of restoring the sector will cost $8.4bn.
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One of the biggest challenges will be the clearing of the 61 million tonnes of debris coating Gaza’s land – 15 percent of which is thought to contain toxic substances like asbestos, which is infiltrating the soil and the ground water, as well as unexploded ordinance.
Israel has barred the entry of the heavy equipment required to clear the rubble, although it permitted the deployment of an Egyptian team and vehicles to help with the recovery of the bodies of Israeli captives in late October.
“We then need to test the quality of the water and the soil to ensure that it is fit for agricultural purposes,” Zaqout explained.
Agricultural water wells will also need to be restored, but Zaqout said that the required materials are not available in Gaza.
The cost of greenhouse construction has also soared in the wake of the genocide, due to a lack of construction materials.
“We need lots of investment. If that is available, it will take seven to 10 years to restore the agricultural sector to what it once was,” Zaqout said.
‘Not even a tomato seed’
But this process cannot begin until Israel allows agricultural inputs to enter Gaza, which it continues to tightly restrict.
Alongside the widespread destruction of cultivable land, the policy is designed to eradicate any possibility of recovery.
Since October 2023, Zaqout reported that almost no agricultural imports had entered Gaza.
This includes something as innocuous as seeds, which Israel’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (Cogat) deems “dual use”.
Even fruit and vegetables containing seeds were stopped at the border. NGOs were instructed to remove the pits from dates.
“Not even a tomato seed was let through,” Mariam Al-Jaajaa, general manager of the Arab Group for the Protection of Nature (APN), said. “Seeds are weaponised because they’re a source of life.”
‘Seeds are weaponised because they’re a source of life’
– Mariam Al-Jaajaa, APN general manager
The restrictions predate October 2023. When Israel imposed its blockade on Gaza in 2007, seeds and a vast array of food stuffs – including pasta and olives – were branded “dual use” and barred from entering the strip.
APN has repeatedly stepped in to support farmers in the aftermath of wars, but this time the scale of the devastation outstripped anything they’d seen previously.
Despite this, amid the onslaught, the organisation worked with over 700 farmers to cultivate over 13,000 dunams of land, producing seven million kilograms of vegetables.
Amid the ban on agricultural imports, APN turned to procuring and cultivating locally, finding seeds in local storages and nurseries.
But prices were skyrocketing amid the Israeli-imposed siege.
“Before the war, it cost $5000 to cultivate land to produce food. Now, it costs $25,000,” Jaajaa said.
‘No solution without justice’
Jaajaa noted that APN’s work was only possible due to the fact that the organisation is independently funded and not bound by the same bureaucracy as big NGOs who she said tend to focus on food aid over support for Gaza’s agriculture.
“When we began our outreach, we found around 600 farmers who had access to their lands. They wanted support for the inputs of production. It was that easy. But we found ourselves among the very few organisations who were doing this work,” Jaajaa told MEE.
For Jaajaa, the reluctance of big NGOs to engage in the work of restoring Gaza’s agricultural land stems from the political implications of Palestinians having control over their croplands.
“It’s a source of food. It’s the most important economic sector for Palestinians. But it also protects lands from confiscation because if lands are cultivated, it’s more difficult to confiscate them,” Jaajaa said.
But a thriving agricultural sector also allows Palestinians within the territory to sustain themselves.
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“All these international organisations are focusing on what was destroyed all through the war. But you should also focus on what can be cultivated,” according to Jaajaa.
“If they’re saying two percent of the land is fertile and can be accessible, that’s around 2300 dunams. Farmers are waiting for assistance and their inputs. So go ahead and plant them. We believe that, politically, these organisations do not have the autonomy to do sustainable projects in Gaza,” she added.
Before Israel launched its genocidal war, Palestinian farmers not only had to contend with tight restrictions on agricultural inputs, but also on their exports – forcing them to reorient their crops to products like strawberries and flowers, which were permitted by Israel.
Thirty percent of Gaza’s arable land was lost to Israel’s “buffer zone”, which runs along the length of the boundary fence hemming the territory.
Similarly, Palestinian fishermen were restricted to an area within six nautical miles off Gaza’s shoreline in the north and 15 in the south. Since October 2023, many have been unable to access the sea at all, with a few risking their lives by boarding flimsy vessels to cast their nets.
Jaajaa emphasised that any significant recovery of Gaza’s food system is dependent on Palestinians’ ability to control every aspect of production, something which Israel has long denied them and wielded as a weapon.
“You can’t have a sustainable resolution without having justice.”
