I go to the market only to look around because I cannot afford to buy anything
Each year, Eid al-Adha asks families to gather, sacrifice, and celebrate the endurance of faith — but in Gaza in May 2026, that ancient rhythm has been nearly silenced. Two years of displacement, the near-total destruction of livestock, and an economy strangled by blockade have placed even the most modest holiday traditions beyond reach for most of the territory's 2.1 million residents. A ceasefire exists on paper, yet the conditions of war persist in the markets, the tent camps, and the hands of parents who return from shopping empty. What remains is not celebration, but the stubborn human insistence on marking what still matters, even when almost everything has been taken.
- Sheep prices have surged tenfold — from 1,000 to as much as 15,000 shekels — because three-quarters of Gaza's livestock were lost to war, turning the central ritual of Eid into a luxury almost no family can afford.
- With 80% of buildings damaged and aid entry points controlled by Israel, shortages have hardened into a permanent condition, keeping inflation at crisis levels even after the October 2025 ceasefire.
- Families cannot bake traditional sweets at home because cooking gas is unavailable, and the same items in markets sell at prices that are equally out of reach, closing off both paths to observance.
- A small number of families with pooled resources — sometimes scraping together the equivalent of thousands of dollars — manage to purchase a single sacrificial animal, an act that was once ordinary and is now exceptional.
- In makeshift shelters, some Gazans are shaping dough by hand and firing clay ovens they built themselves, preserving fragments of tradition through improvisation rather than abundance.
- Across the territory, the holiday arrives not as relief but as a mirror — reflecting how much has been lost and how uncertain the path back to ordinary life remains.
Nadia Abu Shamala walks through the market in Deir al-Balah, where she has spent more than two years in a tent after being displaced from northern Gaza. She looks at the prices and leaves without buying anything. "Whenever I ask about prices, I return heartbroken," she said. For her and millions of others, Eid al-Adha in May 2026 arrived without the new clothes, the sacrificial meat, or the homemade sweets that have always defined it.
A ceasefire brokered in October 2025 did not restore normal life. Israeli airstrikes continued, 80% of Gaza's buildings remained damaged or destroyed, and Israel's control over every entry point kept aid flows too thin to stabilize prices. The result was an economy frozen in crisis long after the formal fighting slowed.
The sharpest symbol of that crisis was the price of sheep. Before the war, a family could purchase one for around 1,000 shekels. By 2026, the same animal cost between 11,000 and 15,000 shekels. The UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation estimated that only about 15,000 sheep remained in all of Gaza — roughly a quarter of the pre-war population — because farms had collapsed, imports were blocked, and feed costs had soared. "Families like ours, who used to make sacrifices every year, are now unable even to buy one kilogramme of meat," said Ahmed Abu Salem, 50, of Gaza City.
A handful of families with combined resources managed to buy a single animal. Abu Abdullah al-Mosadar, 59, gathered around 13,000 shekels with his brother to perform the ritual — an amount almost no one else could assemble. He spoke of hoping to rebuild his business one day, a future that felt more like a wish than a plan.
Without cooking gas, traditional holiday biscuits could not be made at home, and market prices put them equally out of reach. In Khan Yunis, one family found another way: a woman and her daughter shaped maamoul dough by hand beneath a tarp bearing the UNICEF logo, while a man baked the biscuits in a clay oven he had constructed himself. It was a small, determined act of cultural survival.
Shamala, looking toward the holiday from her tent, described what remained: "Only worries, fear, and exhaustion, without any of the happiness we once knew." The ceasefire had not returned what the war had taken. It had left Gaza's people suspended — present, but unable to live as they once had, or to mark the moments that had always given life its shape.
Nadia Abu Shamala walks through the market in Deir al-Balah, where she has lived in a tent for more than two years, displaced from her home in Gaza's north. She looks at the prices and turns away empty-handed. "I go to the market only to look around because I cannot afford to buy anything," she told reporters. "Whenever I ask about prices, I return heartbroken."
This May, as Muslims across the world prepared to celebrate Eid al-Adha—the holiday marking the end of the Hajj pilgrimage and commemorating the Prophet Ibrahim's willingness to sacrifice his son—Gazans faced a holiday stripped of its traditional markers. New clothes for children, the meat from a sacrificial animal, the homemade biscuits that define the feast: all were either impossible to find or far beyond what families could afford. For Shamala, 40, the weight of it was simple and crushing. "This year, Eid comes with none of the joy we once knew in Gaza because of the effects of the war, the soaring prices, and our inability to provide even the simplest needs for our children."
A ceasefire brokered by the United States had begun in October 2025, but the territory remained fractured. Israeli airstrikes continued. Eighty percent of Gaza's buildings had been damaged or destroyed. The vast majority of the 2.1 million people living there depended entirely on humanitarian aid to survive. Israel controlled every entry point into Gaza, and the aid that trickled through—along with whatever private goods made it past the checkpoints—arrived in quantities too small to stabilize prices or ease the shortages that had calcified during the war.
The most visible crisis was the price of sheep. Central to Eid al-Adha is the ritual sacrifice of an animal, a practice rooted in Islamic tradition and observed by Muslim families for centuries. Before the war, a sheep cost around 1,000 shekels. Now, in May 2026, the same animal sold for between 11,000 and 15,000 shekels—a tenfold increase. The reason was brutal arithmetic: only about 15,000 sheep remained in all of Gaza, roughly one quarter of the pre-war population, according to the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation. Livestock could not be imported. Farms had shut down. Feed and transportation costs had soared. "We have never heard of such prices in our lives," said Ahmed Abu Salem, a 50-year-old resident of Gaza City. "Families like ours, who used to make sacrifices every year, are now unable even to buy one kilogramme of meat for our children."
A few families with resources pooled what they had. Abu Abdullah al-Mosadar, a 59-year-old former property dealer from a well-established family in central Gaza, told reporters he and his brother had gathered around 13,000 shekels—roughly $4,570—to purchase a single sheep for sacrifice. It was an amount almost no one else could manage. Mosadar said he knew the price was extraordinary, but he had decided to perform the ritual anyway. He spoke of hoping to restart his construction and real estate business when conditions allowed, a future that felt distant and uncertain.
Without gas for cooking, families could not bake the traditional sweets—kaak, maamoul, and others—that mark the holiday. Abu Ahmed Wafi, 42, displaced with his family in south Gaza, described the trap: markets sold these items, but at prices families could not pay, and even if they could, there was no fuel to heat an oven at home. In Khan Yunis, one family managed to prepare maamoul under a makeshift shelter covered with a reused tarp bearing the UNICEF logo. A woman and her daughter sat on the ground, shaping dough by hand in the traditional Gaza style, while a man baked the biscuits in a clay oven he had built himself. It was ingenuity born of necessity, a small act of cultural persistence in the midst of collapse.
From her tent in Deir al-Balah, Shamala looked toward the holiday with exhaustion rather than anticipation. "We are still living in tents with no atmosphere of joy, only worries, fear, and exhaustion, without any of the happiness we once knew," she said. The ceasefire had not restored what the war had taken. It had only left Gazans in a state of suspension—alive, but unable to live in the way they once had, unable to mark the moments that had always held meaning.
Citações Notáveis
This year, Eid comes with none of the joy we once knew in Gaza because of the effects of the war, the soaring prices, and our inability to provide even the simplest needs for our children.— Nadia Abu Shamala, 40, displaced Gazan
Families like ours, who used to make sacrifices every year, are now unable even to buy one kilogramme of meat for our children.— Ahmed Abu Salem, 50, Gaza City resident
A Conversa do Hearth Outra perspectiva sobre a história
Why does the price of a sheep matter so much? It's one animal.
Because it's not about the sheep. It's about whether a family can participate in their own religious life. For two thousand years, Muslims have marked this holiday by making a sacrifice. When the price goes from a thousand shekels to fifteen thousand, you're not just pricing out a meal—you're pricing people out of their faith practice.
But people are surviving on aid. Surely the ceasefire should have helped with that?
The ceasefire stopped the active fighting, but it didn't open the borders. Israel still controls what comes in and how much. So prices stay inflated because supply is artificially constrained. A ceasefire isn't the same as reconstruction.
What does it feel like to celebrate a holiday when you can't afford any of it?
It's not celebration. It's watching other people celebrate, or remembering what it used to feel like. One woman said she goes to the market just to look. She knows she can't buy anything. She goes anyway, and comes home heartbroken.
Is there any way families are adapting?
Yes, but it's exhausting. They pool money with relatives. They build clay ovens under tarps. They make do with less. But adaptation isn't the same as dignity. You can improvise a holiday, but you can't improvise away the fact that you're living in a tent and can't feed your children meat.
What happens next year?
No one knows. The livestock population is a quarter of what it was. Farms are still closed. Unless something fundamental changes—unless borders open, unless aid flows differently—next year's Eid will look like this one. And the year after that.