Fishermen in Gaza say they are facing their toughest conditions since the start of the Israeli war, with Israeli forces preventing them from accessing the sea to earn a living and exposing them to gunfire or arrest, both during periods of truce and even after the ceasefire reached last October.
Israeli forces target Gaza fishermen with live ammunition or detain some for allegedly violating bans on fishing or even diving. Restrictions imposed on Gaza residents also leave them largely unable to swim.
Nafez Jarbou, 53, a fisherman from the Beach refugee camp west of Gaza City, told Asharq Al-Awsat that Israeli naval boats destroyed his fishing vessel during the war. He supports a family of 16, including four relatives who worked with him in fishing, all of whom lost their livelihoods.
“When the first truce began in January 2025, we tried to return to fishing using another boat belonging to neighbors whose sons, also fishermen, were killed by Israeli forces,” Jarbou said. “But we were surprised to find we were still barred from fishing.”
Hope briefly returned after the ceasefire was announced. But Jarbou said that, like thousands of other fishermen, he encountered “severe restrictions.” He later tried to resume fishing with his sons within less than one nautical mile from Gaza City’s shoreline.
Israeli naval boats continued to pursue them, opening fire or attempting to arrest them and confiscate their boats, he said.
Diving replaces fishing
With traditional fishing routes effectively closed despite the ceasefire, Gaza’s fishing activity has sharply declined. Even fishing within a one-nautical-mile range has become increasingly restricted.
Faced with these limits, fishermen have turned to diving with simple, rudimentary equipment to avoid being pursued or targeted.
But Jarbou said diving prevents them from catching most types of fish.
“All we can catch now is small sardines, which are not in high demand,” he said.
According to the Gaza Fishermen’s Union, more than 5,000 fishermen worked in the sector before the war.
At least 235 have been killed during Israeli military operations, most in airstrikes that hit their homes or the homes of relatives.
Another 40 fishermen were killed, and dozens were wounded while working at sea at extremely short distances from shore, sometimes less than 500 meters, and in some cases just 200 meters. Israeli forces have also arrested around 43 fishermen.
Mohammed al-Habil, 31, from the Beach refugee camp, was recently released after being detained off Gaza City’s coast.
“We went through a long ordeal in prison after I was arrested with two of my relatives while working at sea to make a living,” he told Asharq Al-Awsat.
Al-Habil said interrogators did not focus on his fishing work but instead sought “information about Hamas members in my area.”
He added that Israeli forces have long targeted fishermen, even before the latest war, attempting to arrest them and recruit them as informants.
“Words cannot describe our living conditions,” he said. “We have joined the large army of unemployed in Gaza.”
He questioned the role of mediators overseeing the ceasefire in ensuring safety for fishermen and allowing them to work at least within two or three nautical miles, an area he said “would not pose any security threat to Israel.”
“Starvation policy”
Zakaria Bakr, head of the Union of Workers in Gaza’s fishing sector, said Israel is “deliberately depriving fishermen of work at sea to starve them,” describing the move as part of a collective punishment policy against the enclave.
Preventing fishing, even within limited distances, despite the ceasefire shows the main goal is to destroy what remains of the fishing sector, which has already suffered heavy damage since the war began, he said.
“What is happening is the destruction of fishermen by depriving them of their livelihoods,” Bakr told Asharq Al-Awsat.
Each fisherman supports at least four family members who depend on the fish they sell, fish that are now largely unavailable under current restrictions imposed by Israel, he said.
The Gaza Center for Human Rights said Israel has imposed strict restrictions aimed at the comprehensive destruction of the fishing sector’s infrastructure and deepening a policy of starvation affecting thousands of fishermen’s families.
The group said Israeli forces destroyed trawlers and large fishing vessels, the backbone of Gaza’s fish production, inside the main Gaza port and the harbors of Khan Younis and Rafah, putting them permanently out of service.
More than 95% of small boats and more than 100 larger vessels have been destroyed, along with fishing equipment and boat-building workshops, it said.
