Gaza academics endure hunger while continuing to teach

A Gaza based academic describes the toll of hunger and siege on teaching, research and solidarity.

Gaza academics endure hunger while continuing to teach

Since March 2, 2025, Gaza has faced a strict blockade that limits food, medicine and fuel. Markets are empty, bakeries closed, and aid arrives in small, irregular drops. The World Health Organization reports 74 deaths from malnutrition this year, including 24 children under five in July, signaling that famine is here rather than a distant threat.

The essay chronicles the toll on students and teachers: hunger disrupts concentration, a dwindling cash supply forces people to rely on cash-only purchases, and bank notes are worn or rejected. With bank branches damaged and ATMs nonfunctional, access to money costs time and energy, sometimes up to 50 percent in informal exchanges. Yet the writer insists that continuing to teach and bear witness is not bravado but necessity, a form of resistance against erasure.

The piece turns personal hardship into a lens on systemic failure. It highlights how hunger is not only a health crisis but a barrier to education and critical inquiry. By foregrounding everyday acts of solidarity and the stubborn persistence of scholars, it suggests that knowledge production in Gaza remains possible only when frameworks of support adapt to crisis. The call to rethink solidarity from charity to structural change adds a political edge, urging funders and institutions to address the root causes of deprivation rather than treating it as a temporary disruption.

Highlights

Solidarity is not abstract; it demands concrete actions that sustain both minds and communities.