Gaza farmers restart agriculture on war-ravaged lands after 15 months of Israeli offensive

After returning to their lands, the farmers of Gaza attempted to resume agriculture by using decades-old cultivation methods due to the lack of resources on war-ravaged land. 

Beit Lahiya, a city in north Gaza, once provided at least 60% of vegetables and fruit to the strip; however, Israeli forces now destroyed cultivations on hectares of land, devastating the area's agricultural production. 

A video report shared by Al-Jazeera quoted Zaher Tantish, who lost his “six hectares of land carrying thousands of trees,” believing that “Some can’t even farm their lands as they are close to the Israeli forces’ presence in the north,” said.

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Zaher also stated that regenerating income through agriculture would be very difficult, as “each tree takes four to five years to bear enough fruit to sell and make a profit. These trees survived for generations.”

The 15-month-long Israeli war multiplied the bad weeds and worms, “we need pesticides to fight them, but we cannot find so far,” said a farmer who was leading the children to find out the warm killer pesticides. 

A green field of June 2023 in Gaza had been changed into debris in more than one and half years of war, now the orchard of strawberries turned dry. 

“Over livelihoods are destroyed, we can no longer plant strawberries, we won’t be able to continue without support from the outside,” said Munther Abu Rabee, a strawberry farmer. 

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Lack of water, equipment, and raw materials fueled the complications for Gazans to resume their agriculture. 

“Getting water is now a challenge, before war we had solar panels, I was able to extract water from wells every day from 10 am to 5 pm free of cost,” Munther added, claiming that he was having to pay $30 for extracting water for an hour for his strawberry firm.

Notably, Gaza exports strawberries to the occupied West Bank, Israel and Europe. But 15 months of Israel’s military offensive have left its farmland in ruins.