Women in Gaza say they were offered food, money or jobs in exchange for sex as humanitarian crisis deepens

Several women in the Gaza Strip have told journalists they were pressured or propositioned with offers of food, cash or promises of work in return for sexual interactions, a distressing pattern that aid groups and protection experts say is emerging as the humanitarian emergency deepens.

Reporters who interviewed survivors and local psychologists describe increasingly explicit solicitations at or after aid distribution points, through follow-up contact, and via men who posed as intermediaries or, in a few accounts, as aid workers.

The reports come amid a catastrophic collapse in basic services and supply lines in Gaza. United Nations agencies and humanitarian clusters warn of soaring malnutrition and sharp reductions in available food, medicine and fuel, with particular alarm over child malnutrition and deaths linked to shortages.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) and aid agencies say the siege-era conditions — limited humanitarian corridors, attack-damaged infrastructure and bureaucratic restrictions — have left civilians with few safe options for survival.

Those conditions, protection specialists argue, create the power imbalances that predators exploit.

International and local protection networks say the phenomenon of “survival sex” — exchanging sexual acts for food, shelter or other essentials — is well-documented in many conflict and displacement contexts, but usually remains severely underreported because of stigma, fear of reprisals, and lack of safe reporting channels.

In Gaza, the social stigma attached to sexual exploitation, restrictions on movement and communications, and the collapse of formal protection services mean many victims are reluctant to go public. Psychologists and local NGOs told reporters they have seen a rise in such cases but expect the true scale to be much higher than formal figures suggest.

Aid agencies, including UNRWA and other UN bodies, say they operate zero-tolerance policies on sexual exploitation and abuse (PSEA) and have teams and hotlines intended to receive complaints.

Still, investigators and protection coordinators stress that meaningful inquiry and accountability are hampered by the ongoing conflict environment: investigators cannot easily reach sites, witnesses are dispersed or fearful, documentary evidence is thin, and access to detainees or alleged perpetrators is limited.

Local actors and PSEA networks report a number of formal allegations over the past year, though they all stress that numbers are far from a comprehensive measure of abuse.

Human rights and health organisations also highlight that the situation for women and girls in Gaza has been degraded on multiple fronts.

UN and independent inquiries over the course of the war have documented damage to maternity and women’s health services, an alarming rise in injuries and a collapse in reproductive healthcare capacity — trends that increase vulnerability to gender-based violence and reduce survivors’ options for medical and psychosocial care.

Human Rights Watch and UN officials have repeatedly urged that protection from sexual violence be central to any humanitarian response.

Local accounts collected by independent reporters describe multiple modalities of exploitation: women reporting men showing up at families’ homes after learning of need, cold-calling or messaging women who registered for aid, and promises of cash or food conditional on sexual favours.

Some women told reporters they were threatened or shamed when they refused; at least one account described a pregnancy resulting from coercive exploitation.

Investigators caution that while such accounts are credible and consistent across interviews, each allegation requires careful, confidential investigation to establish facts and to protect survivors.

The wider humanitarian community says addressing the issue requires both immediate and structural steps: restore and increase safe, impartial delivery of life-saving assistance; set up discreet, survivor-centred reporting and referral pathways; strengthen PSEA coordination between agencies and local civil society; and ensure independent, protected investigations where allegations arise.

Donors and UN agencies have repeatedly been urged to scale up funding for protection services and to ensure that assistance modalities minimise opportunities for exploitation — for example, by decentralising distributions, improving beneficiary verification that avoids sharing sensitive personal data, and increasing cash-assistance where feasible.