he says. He spends two hours walking in scorching heat to find, and haggle over, ingredients.

 Staples like onions, which he knows will lift his family's spirits, are a luxury in Gaza. A single clove of garlic costs him £2 ($3) - about 10 times what his family used to pay for a pack of four whole bulbs. He also manages to track down the other ingredients he needs. “We bought brown lentils and whole lentils, rice, I also got some tomato sauce to go on top, and a little onion, because mujaddara is all about the onions,” he says.

Like food, cash is in short supply in Gaza, as ATMs and banks have been destroyed or ceased operating during the war, and large injections of cash have been barred by Israel, which says they would be used by Hamas. Mosab says the commission rates the family have to pay to get cash can be more than 50%. The financial crisis is deepening, he says, and families like his may not be able to sustain even their current standard of living for much longer. People also directly sell on the goods they have risked their lives for at aid sites. “They sell it to you, but at an astronomical price. You end up begging them to sell,” Mosab says.

Flour is particularly scarce, he says. Sometimes, rumours circulate that it is available and people rush to the market, only to be disappointed. That day, Mosab contacted acquaintances and friends and eventually tracked some flour down to make bread, about a 4km (2.5-mile) walk away. “I managed to pressure the guy into selling me a [25kg] bag of flour for 700 shekels (about £150/$200),” Mosab says - explaining that it is roughly 30 times the pre-war price. At that rate, a standard 1.5kg bag of plain flour in the UK, currently costing as little as 70p, would cost £9. “It’s infuriating. On top of that… carrying it is exhausting, and the sun in the middle of the day is brutal, it really drains you.”

It is not just food in short supply. Much of the infrastructure needed to distribute clean water has been badly damaged or destroyed and most people now rely on sporadic deliveries from desalination plants that are still operating. When Mosab’s family wake that day, they have a container and a half of water left - about 12 litres.

“We’re hoping fresh water arrives. If it doesn’t, we’ll have to go a very long way [to desalination plants]… and the water we’ll bring back won’t really be fresh, but there’s no other option,” Mosab says. Later in the day, there is elation and chaos at the camp as word spreads that tankers are on their way. “The whole camp started running without even thinking,” Mosab says.

Preparing a meal also requires fuel. Mosab says a lighter, purchased for about 100 shekels (£22/$30), is shared between 25 families. Like food, water and fuel, the prices of lighters fluctuate - you can now buy one for about half that price, he says.  People in his camp cook meagre meals on makeshift stoves, over fires sometimes stoked by their old furniture.

After returning from the market, he chops wood with an axe and hammer shared among neighbours. His family still have a supply of firewood, bought a few days earlier from a man a long distance away who was willing to accept a bank transfer rather than cash. Wood is sometimes sourced from the rubble of homes bombed by Israeli forces. Some people sell debris in exchange for cash, Mosab says - some people can’t afford wood at all. Splitting the wood is exhausting, and Mosab cuts himself twice in the process. “God willing, the days of gas will come back,” he says.

In addition to the wood, Mosab burns plastic as fuel, which is easier to come by and cheaper. He says they know the fumes are bad for their health, but eating is more important.

Mosab’s mum prepares the mujaddara, which he eats on the floor of the family’s tent. “It tasted very good… but normally it would taste even better. We didn’t have enough onions,” he later says. He knows that others in his camp will not eat at all, and says the disparity weighs on him.

As the sun sets, he collects yellow-tinged, salty water from a well and heads to his seedlings next to his family’s tent in the west of the camp. “I have no choice but to use it even though it harms the seedlings and the crops,” he says.

Mosab dreams of continuing his engineering degree once the war is over. As he prepares for another day of heading to the markets, he also dreams of a day when food is freely available in Gaza. In the meantime, he says, “we just keep taking from the well and watering our plants”. (BBC)