GAZA: When Israeli airstrikes destroyed his family’s home in November, Zein Oroq was pinned under the rubble. He was injured but survived, while 17 members of his extended family died.
But 13-year-old Zein then suffered a terrible fate in Gaza, where Palestinians face shortages of medicine, food and water in a worsening humanitarian crisis.
Residents of the small enclave, where Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas have been fighting for more than six months, are at risk of starvation.
Last week, when aid was provided by air, the teenager was surprised by one of the packages as he rushed to grab a can of fava beans, rice or flour.
“The first time his house broke down, he came out from under the rubble with wounds on his head, hands and feet, God saved him,” said Zein’s grandfather, Ali Oroq.
The grandfather, who was standing near a large puddle of waste water, remembered how Zein swam in the pool to get food from air droplets, and how he was supposed to sit at a school desk to get an education.
