Buying gas in Gaza? — Don't think about it

The ceasefire initiated in early October is not on pace to materialize into a sufficient flow of aid to Gaza. The light increase of aid instead has been mostly about political maneuvering rather than about sustaining life in Gaza and reversing the impact of over two years of relentless bombing that has destroyed virtually all of the economic infrastructure and agricultural capacity in Gaza. The recent flow of aid is barely above the tracking data from October 2023 through September 2025. 

The data since October 2023 reveals manufactured catastrophic price increases across essential food staples, with the most dramatic shifts occurring in protein sources and fuel. Eggs experienced the steepest rise among core dietary items, surging 3,613 percent from pre-genocide prices, with Israel turning a basic protein source into a luxury commodity priced at 495 ILS per 2kg carton by September 2025. Bread prices climbed 671 percent despite dramatic month-to-month volatility, including a 70 percent crash in one period, while chicken increased 525 percent. Cooking oil rose 108 percent, and flour increased 172 percent for a 50kg sack. 

Fresh produce showed equally severe distortions, with bell peppers rising 2,600 percent and chili peppers increasing 2,508 percent, while lemons climbed 2,561 percent and cucumbers jumped 1,715 percent. Water delivery costs increased by 598-900 percent depending on volume, transforming a human right into an economic burden. The few commodities showing price decreases—notably Egyptian rice, which fell 65 percent, and Basmati rice, down 44 percent—reflect aid substitution rather than market recovery, as humanitarian rice shipments temporarily flooded specific segments while other essentials remained unreachable. At the same time, other essentials remained out of reach. The most extreme price escalation occurred in gas cylinders, which skyrocketed 5,795 percent to reach 4,200 ILS by September 2025 — effectively pricing most families out of cooking fuel entirely and forcing them to rely on unsafe alternatives, such as plastics or chemically treated wood to cook their food and boil water for their tea. 

Israel's genocide in Gaza has created one of the most distorted economies in the world, where cucumber prices have increased 1715.27% since Oct 7, 2023. This is a commodity generally available year-round in Palestine. These aid delivery patterns, which are characterized by disruptions and uncertainty, coupled with the Israeli assault on infrastructure and agricultural lands, create wild price swings that bear no relation to regular market forces — which, of course, is by design. 

Data curated by the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics and the UN2720 Mechanism for Gaza reveal the stark connection between aid restrictions and manufactured economic chaos. In the 30 days preceding October 23, 2025 humanitarian convoys faced a 36 percent interception rate — with zionist backed mobs capturing life-giving aid — and another 9,029 metric tons of supplies turned back at checkpoints by the Israeli military. During this period, Gazans confronted extraordinary price volatility. Cheese (lebaneh) prices surged 165 percent in a single month, and all basic commodities remained astronomically high, as Israel effectively held the entire economy of the Gaza Strip hostage. 

The ceasefire beginning October 10 offered a glimpse of what happens when restrictions ease and Palestinians can exercise a modicum of self-governance. Aid interception rates dropped to just 9 percent after Gaza’s government security forces were able to gain control in some of the areas where the Israel-backed Abu Shabab group was operating to disrupt aid delivery, and daily truck arrivals increased from 78.8 to 93.9. Food deliveries rose 18 percent, water and sanitation supplies jumped 71 percent, and agricultural inputs increased 142 percent. Yet even this improvement won’t begin to normalize an economy fundamentally broken by Israel’s prolonged restrictions. 

The human cost manifests in price comparisons that defy economic logic. Gaza households pay double, triple, or quadruple the prices US American or European families would pay for equivalent food baskets. Eggs cost 22.6 times their European price. Apples are 20 times more expensive than in EU markets. These aren't temporary wartime premiums, like liberal understandings posit: they reflect an economy in which scarcity has been systematically engineered through checkpoint controls and the methodical dismantling of Gazan agricultural lands and production forces.

The post-ceasefire data exposes another troubling pattern: selective improvement. While food and water supplies increased, health supplies actually decreased by 58 percent, and solid fuel decreased by 48 percent. This suggests that even when overall aid access improves, bottlenecks and prioritization decisions continue to distort market availability, harming vulnerable populations that desperately need medical care and the ability to rebuild. This, of course, restricts Palestinians from returning to their homes in the north of Gaza — which Israel has been working against. 

The economy is contingent on US imperial interests and Israeli domestic Zionist political rhetoric, which ultimately define humanitarian convoy movements that perpetuate cycles of famine and small periods of relief. When checkpoint policies tighten, merchants hoard and prices spike. When convoys get through, prices can crash as suddenly as they rose. This creates an environment where families cannot plan, businesses cannot function, and the concept of a "market price" becomes meaningless.

Israel's siege on Gaza has produced price disparities that would be impossible in any connected economy. The price inflation isn't explained by transportation costs or conflict risk alone—it reflects the systematic strangling of commercial supply chains combined with controlled and disrupted humanitarian substitution. Aid agencies now deliver an average of 865 metric tons daily, but this represents only a fraction of what the 2 million Palestinians require.

The fundamental issue isn't whether aid increased after the ceasefire, but whether humanitarian supplies can ever substitute for a functioning economy. The post-ceasefire period showed daily deliveries of 1,011 metric tons—an improvement, yet still dependent on maintaining 94 trucks crossing daily. A single policy change at a checkpoint can reverse these gains overnight.

What emerges is a picture of economic manipulation through access control. Price volatility isn't a side effect of what many who are divorced from the historical realities of colonialism like to describe as a “conflict”—it's part of the logical outworkings of zionism. When dry Palestinian lemons have increased 2560.75% their normal price, and cheese (lebaneh) prices can jump 165 percent in 30 days, the market isn't failing. On the contrary, it's working exactly as designed by those who control what crosses the borders. Until restrictions are abolished rather than lifted temporarily on the whims and interests of the United States  and broader zionist movement, Gaza's economy will remain not just broken, but deliberately fractured.