What's life like inside the world's biggest prison?

Disclaimer : Opinions are my own and not the views of my employer.

To find out, you don't have to commit any crime. You just have to be born in Gaza. This tiny strip of flat, open Palestinian land, about 25 miles long and only 7 miles wide at its widest point, is surrounded by Egypt and the Mediterranean Sea to the south and west and Israel, which has closed Gaza off to the outside world since the early 90s.

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Like many prisons, Gaza is overcrowded. In 2021, the population grew to over 2 million, with one of the highest population densities in the world. Imagine Detroit which has about the same size, Gaza has three times of its population. But where did all these people come from? Well, about 70% of Gazans are refugee and their descendants. They were forced to move there when Israel took over their towns and villages around the time it was founded in 1948. Many fled thinking they were temporarily getting to safety. But Israel has never allowed them to go back. Despite many of these towns and villages being a short drive or walking distance from Gaza. Israel went on to occupy Gaza in 1967, impose military rule on the people who live there, and gave part of its territory to Israeli settlers.

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In the early 90s, it imposed a closure policy on Gaza. Palestinians there could no longer leave without a time restricted, hard-to-get permit. And Palestinians from other areas were restricted from visiting Gaza as well. But it was in 2006 when things got really bad. Israel had pulled its soldiers and setters out of Gaza the year before, while still controlling the borders, the airspace, and the economy. The Palestinian group, Hamas, which has a military wing that fight the Israeli occupation, won Palestinian elections, and took over Gaza. In response, Israel took its policies to the next level. The only power plant was bombed, travel was banned, most imports and exports were blocked, forcing most of Gaza's factories to shut down. Fisherman couldn't fish beyond a very limited area. Supplies of fuel and electricity were reduced so much, that people converted their cars to run on cooking oil. Even medical supplies were restricted. The Israeli government decided how much food would be let in by calculating how many calories everyone in Gaza would get (speaking of diet huh?). As a government advisor (Dov Weisglass) said, "the idea is to put the Palestinians on a diet, but not make them die of hunger". These policies crushed Gaza's economy. It now has the highest unemployment rate in the world, and more than half the people live under the poverty line.

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Even material to build the infrastructure like sewage treatment plants, has been held back so raw sewage is pumped into the sea. In 2012, the UN said that if things didn’t get better, Gaza would be unlivable by 2020. Instead, things got even worse. There have been several major military assaults by Israel on Gaza. Israel says the goal of these assaults is to limit Hamas' ability to fight. Thousands of civilians have been killed, and tens of thousands of homes destroyed in these assaults. Israeli officials call it "moving the lawn". But even when the assault stopped, supplies to rebuild are often prevented by Israel from entering the territory. Meanwhile, the Egyptian government is a close ally of the Israeli government and has long helped maintain the siege. Its border with Gaza has often been closed as well. When the border does open, only a few hundrer people are allowed in or out. For a while, Gazans built a tunnel economy under that border, smuggling in everything from urgently needed supplies to weapon, to even fast food from Egypt. But the Egyptian government eventually flooded many of the tunnels and even destroyed one of its own border town to cut off these supplies. About half of Gaza's population are children, meaning they have only ever known life under this blockade. For them, a full day with electricity is not normal. They know when the bombing starts, there's nowhere for them to flee. They know that when they get older, they're probably not going to find work. They likely will not be able to leave Gaza. Or even meet Palestinians from other parts of their country. They know what it's like living in the world's biggest prison.