Mohammed Barghout, 47, sits on a plastic chair at the Excellence Café in Khan Younis. Next to him, a man pulls out a stack of shekels and counts out a few banknotes.
The man checks his phone to confirm that a bank transfer of about $100 (about $144 CAD or 360 shekels) sent by Barghout has been received before handing over 200 shekels (about $80 CAD) to the father of four children explains that he has a share of around 30 percent. Barghout shakes the man’s hand and they part ways.
Such men are known as money changers and are becoming a way of life in the war-torn enclave, where most banks are closed or damaged, meaning many Palestinians struggle to withdraw cash from their accounts.
Instead, they are forced to transfer money digitally to money changers, who provide the cash equivalent of the transfer after taking a share themselves, typically 25 to 30 percent. What’s left won’t go far, as wartime inflation has driven up the prices of scarce food and essential goods.
“I have a baby, now a year old. He wants milk, he wants to be pampered. I also have three small children. You have to eat,” Barghout told CBC freelance videographer Mohamed El Saife.
“I lose a lot of money to have money.”
We accompanied a Palestinian on a trip to a market in Gaza to see how much he could buy with 200 shekels – about $80 CAD – to feed his family.
“There is no cash”
Ayed Abu Ramadan, chairman of the Gaza Chamber of Commerce, says Gaza’s banking system has completely collapsed.
“We have a problem with the banknotes,” he said. “There is no cash. And the small amounts of cash are worn out and torn, so people refuse to accept them.”
While the person who met with Barghout declined an interview, another person agreed to speak to CBC News.
Saadi Al-Ashqar runs an exchange office in Deir al Balah, where he offers the same service, but from a shop where customers come to him. He says he buys cash from other businessmen.
“I… pay the businessman the top 30 percent to keep my business and my exchange house running.”
He told El Saife that these top businessmen control cash flow in the Gaza Strip and that the only way to deposit and withdraw money is through a digital banking application linked to the Bank of Palestine. People use it to transfer money to Palestinians, who then have to visit a money changer to receive cash.
Al-Ashqar says he sees almost 200 people wanting to withdraw cash every day. But he says he feels sorry for businessmen who rake in such large shares of stock markets.
“Those who control this situation are unfortunately taking advantage of the situation in which we and citizens live,” he said.
Talks to negotiate a ceasefire and hostage release deal between Israel and Hamas have resumed in Cairo, and sources close to the negotiations say an agreement could be signed in the coming days. Palestinians in the southern Gaza Strip hope this round of talks will lead to an end to the war so that life can resume.
Abu Ramadan of the Chamber of Commerce says the exchange rates are “really putting a huge burden on people.”
“It reduces their purchasing power and increases their problems.”
Choice between food and diapers
With his 200 shekels in hand, Barghout now begins his errands. He is looking for food for his family and diapers for his youngest child.
After the war began, Barghout lost his job as an IT engineer in Gaza City and he and his family were displaced many times before finding their final refuge in a UNRWA school in Khan Younis. He now relies on friends and family abroad to send money when they can.
The Palestinians in Gaza are more or less dependent on humanitarian aid, which, according to Abu Ramadan, does not even cover “20 percent of the population’s needs.” And he says the shortage has caused prices for food and hygiene products to skyrocket.
Families often have to choose between buying diapers or groceries.
“You can’t eat for a day,” Barghout said of the amount he has to spend at the market in Khan Younis, where vendors stand at stalls made of wooden beams and plastic sheeting behind small tables displaying fruit and household products.
Every now and then Barghout stops to inquire about the price of something before walking away.
“It’s very expensive to buy anything now,” he said as he walked to a stall selling individual diapers, arranged in neat piles by size.
“You can’t buy a pack, a pack is very expensive,” he said – a pack of 30 would cost 100 shekels.
Instead, he asks for the price of ten diapers – 30 shekels. So he makes his first purchase of the day.
A meager meal for his children
Next comes coffee, cookies, four bananas, two hard-boiled eggs, some fresh mint, some feta cheese, two rolls of toilet paper and an aluminum foil of rice.
“For my children, everyone will only take one banana. My wife and I will not take anything, (that) is only for my children,” he said.
After 30 minutes at the market, Barghout is done for the day. On the way back to the animal shelter he only has 17 shekels in his pocket. The family of six lives in a dark room under the stairs with only one window for sunlight.
His children jump at the sight of him and run to see what he has brought with him. They open the plastic bags as he gives each child a banana.
“It doesn’t mean anything,” Barghout said. “You can’t fill your stomach.”
As he watches his children sift through the food, trying to fill their bellies with bananas, rice, and their portion of the two eggs, he knows he’ll have to go back to a barter soon to find their next meager meal.
