By Mohamed Majid
GAZA CITY, Palestine (AA) - With financial assistance from Turkey’s Diyanet Vakfi Foundation, Gaza’s Ministry of Awqaf and Religious Affairs has distributed meat to thousands of poor Gazan families for the Eid al-Adha holiday, the ministry announced Monday.
“The ministry distributed meat from more than 100 cows sacrificed for the Eid to some 20,000 poor families throughout the Gaza Strip,” read a ministry statement.
The Hamas-run ministry put the total cost of the initiative at some $200,000, which was borne by the Turkish charitable foundation.
The ministry went on to thank the foundation -- along with the Turkish government -- for the humanitarian assistance that it regularly provides to Gaza’s poor.
For the last 10 years, the Gaza Strip’s two million inhabitants have groaned under a crippling Israeli-Egyptian blockade that has deprived them of many basic commodities, including food and medicine.
As a result, an estimated 80 percent of the strip’s population now depends on international aid to survive, according to official estimates.