Before dawn breaks over Gaza's sprawling displacement camps, thousands of Palestinians begin a daily ritual: searching for bread.
At 4:00 am, Fadi Abu Shamala, 39, walks through the sandy pathways of Al-Mawasi, west of Khan Younis, carrying a small plastic chair to endure hours of waiting outside a bakery.
Displaced from Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza , he arrives long before sunrise in hopes of securing enough bread for his family of six.
"If you arrive after 5:00 am, you'll most likely find nothing," Abu Shamala told The New Arab . "Sometimes people sleep outside bakeries overnight. We wait for hours, only for someone to come out and tell us the flour has run out, or the bakery has stopped because there's no fuel."
With the prices of rice, pasta, vegetables, and canned goods soaring beyond what most displaced families can afford, bread has become the cheapest way to silence hunger, even if only temporarily.
"When there's no bread, we try to buy rice or pasta, but everything is too expensive," he said. "Some days, we only eat once."
As evening approaches, Abu Shamala often returns to his tent after hours of waiting, carrying little more than a single bag of bread.
"Every night, I think about how I'll get bread the next day," he said quietly. "We don't plan for a week anymore—not even for tomorrow. We only think about the next meal."
Across Gaza , scenes like this have become increasingly common as the enclave faces a renewed bread crisis driven by severe flour shortages, restrictions on aid deliveries, and a lack of fuel needed to operate bakeries and flour mills.
While humanitarian organisations have attempted to ease shortages through subsidised bakeries and bread distribution points, supply remains far below demand for a population largely dependent on aid after more than a year and a half of war. A daily search In a displacement camp in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza, 33-year-old Sarah Baraka begins each day before sunrise, leaving her three children asleep inside a worn-out tent as she sets out to search for bread.
"I first go to a distribution centre near the camp […] If there's no bread there, I walk to another bakery several kilometres away. Some days I return in the afternoon with nothing," she told TNA .
Her children constantly ask for bread, she says, because it remains the only food that makes them feel full.
"They ask for it all the time because it's the only thing that fills their stomachs," she said. "When I can't find it, I feel helpless."
For Mahmoud al-Najjar, 48, who was displaced from Rafah to central Gaza, obtaining bread has become "a daily battle" for survival.
Supporting a family of 11, he often waits up to five hours to secure a single bundle of roughly 20 loaves.
"That amount doesn't last us a full day," he said. "We divide the bread between meals, so we don't run out quickly."
When bread is unavailable, his family turns to community kitchens, though those too are overwhelmed.
"Even soup kitchens are overcrowded, and the food runs out fast," he added.
The worsening shortages come as Gaza's broader food insecurity continues to deepen. Since the start of Israel's genocidal war on Gaza in October 2023, repeated border closures and restrictions on humanitarian aid have caused recurring shortages of flour and other essential food items.
Although some periods saw temporary improvements in food availability, those gains have repeatedly collapsed as aid flows declined and regional tensions intensified. Flour shortages, collapsing bakeries The Gaza Government Media Office has warned that bread production has dropped sharply in recent months due to a steep decline in the amount of flour entering the territory.
According to officials, flour deliveries currently stand at just 38 per cent of pre-war levels, despite previous commitments allowing significantly larger volumes of humanitarian aid trucks into Gaza.
Many bakeries are operating with damaged infrastructure after months of war, while others rely on ageing generators that frequently break down due to fuel shortages and the lack of spare parts.
As a result, Gaza is experiencing a severe bread crisis, with production cut by nearly 50 per cent due to restricted aid deliveries, fuel shortages, and damaged infrastructure, according to the Gaza Bakery Owners Association and local reports.
Abdul Nasser al-Ajrami, head of Gaza's Bakers Association, told TNA that Gaza needs around 450 tonnes of flour every day, while the amount currently entering the territory does not exceed 260 tonnes.
The widening gap between supply and demand has forced bakeries to reduce output, leaving many families waiting for hours for bread that often runs out before they reach the front of the queue.
He added that Israeli restrictions continue to block the entry of industrial oils needed to run generators, as well as spare parts required to repair bakery equipment damaged during the war.
Although recent efforts have allowed limited amounts of commercial flour into Gaza , al-Ajrami said those supplies remain insufficient.
The World Food Programme currently produces around 130,000 bread bundles daily through bakeries it supports across Gaza.
According to al-Ajrami, that amount covers only about 30 per cent of the population's daily needs.
"The commercial sector is supposed to fill the remaining gap," he said. "But under current restrictions, that has become nearly impossible."
Palestinian economists warn that the bread crisis reflects a wider economic collapse unfolding across Gaza .
Palestinian economist Samir Abu Mudallala told TNA that the restrictions on fuel, raw materials, and commercial goods have devastated local supply chains while pushing more families into extreme food insecurity.
"Bread has shifted from being an ordinary product available to everyone into something people spend hours searching for every day," he said.
He warned that prolonged shortages could worsen malnutrition, particularly among children, as families run out of affordable alternatives.