This is what happens when money dies Israel’s conflict and the two

You are trying to buy a kilo of flour in Gaza.

Open your wallet. What is inside? Note 10 shekels fade, barely holding together with a tape of the tape. Nobody wants it. Everything is garbage now.

Note 10-SHEKEL, which was usually worth about $ 3, was once the most common bill in daily life. Now, it is no longer a trader. Not official – practically only. It has been worn out of confession. The sellers will not accept this. Buyers cannot use.

There is no new money. No renewal.

Other banknotes follow the ten shekels fate, especially the smaller.

If you pay a 100 shekel to buy 80 shekels, the seller is likely to be unable to restore the remaining twenty due to the bad material state of humans.

Many notes or recorded are torn together, and the entire kiosks are now only present to fix the damaged currency so that they can be used again. Anything better than nothing.

But the disintegration of banknotes is not the only problem we have in Gaza.

Civil service employees have gone for months without pay. Non -governmental organizations are unable to transfer salaries to their employees. Families cannot send transfers. What was once supporting the Gaza financial structure had disappeared. There is no mention of when he will return. Just silence.

Money stuck. Be trapped behind closed systems and political barriers.

If you can obtain money from external sources – perhaps from a cousin in Ramallah or a brother in Egypt – it comes at a cost. One brutal. If 1000 shekels ($ 300) will be sent, the agent will deliver you 500. This is true, the commission rate on cash withdrawals in Gaza is now 50 percent.

There are no banks to provide such withdrawals or supervision of transportation operations.

The signs are still there. Bank of Palestine. Cairo Amman Bank. Jerusalem Bank. But the doors are closed, the windows are dirt, and the inside is empty. The ATM does not work.

There are only brokers, some of them have links to the black market and smugglers, and those who in some way are able to obtain money. They take huge discounts to dispense, in exchange for bank conversion to their accounts.

Each withdrawal looks like a stolen disguised as a treatment. However, people continue to use this system. They have no choice.

Do you have a bank card? great. Try to use it?

There is no power. There is no internet. No points of sale. When your card is on the seller, they shake their heads.

People print screenshots for account balances that cannot reach them. Some wander with expired bank documents, hoping that someone will think that it is “good enough” as a payment guarantee.

No one does.

There are a few sellers who accept the so -called “digital wallets”, but these are few, as well as the people who have them.

In Gaza today, the money that you can not touch is equal to any money at all.

Thus, people must resort to other means.

On the market, I saw a woman standing with a bag of plastic sugar. Another was carrying a bottle of cooking oil. They didn’t talk much. I only nodded. Trading. Leave.

This is what “shopping” in Gaza is now. Trading what you have. A kilo of lentils for a kilogram of flour. Bottle of bleaching for some rice. Child jacket for many onions.

There is no stability. One day, your element will be worth something. The next day, no one wants it. Prices are guesses. The value is emotional. Everything is negotiable.

My uncle, a twin father, told me, “I exchanged my coat to get a bag of diaper.” “He looked at me as if I was begging. I felt that I was giving up a part of my life.”

This is not a tear of simpler times. This is what happens when the systems disappear. When the money dies. When families are forced to sacrifice dignity in order to stay.

People not only suffer – they are shrinking. They reduce their expectations. They stop dreaming. They stop planning. What is the future that you can plan when you cannot afford tomorrow’s costs?

“I sold my gold bracelet,” Lina told me, my neighbor with the tent. “It was for emergency situations. But now, every day is an emergency.”

Gaza’s economy did not collapse due to poor policy or internal mismanagement. It was intentionally broken.

The profession did not prevent the goods entering Gaza. The currency also prevented and with it, that is, a feeling of financial control. The banking system has been destroyed. Liquidity has made a weapon.

Cutting Gaza’s money is part of a greater siege. There is no need to shoot a bullet to destroy people. Simply depriving them of the ability to live.

You cannot pay the price of bread, water, for medicine, so how do you keep life?

If this trend continues, Gaza will be the first modern society to bart. There are no salaries. There is no official market. Only personal deals and informal deals. Even these will not last forever. Because what happens when there is nothing left for trading?

If this is not eaten, Gaza will be more than just a siege area. It will be a place where the concepts of money, economy and fairness will die forever.

The opinions expressed in this article are the author of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of the editorial island.