Over the past few weeks, the question we’ve heard most often is: “How are things over there?”
It’s been a time of deep uncertainty, for our partners in Palestine, and for us. Not just waiting on shipments, but waiting on news. On signs of safety. On whether movement would be possible again.
In the West Bank, towns were placed under siege. Checkpoints were erected and travel ground to a halt. In some places, what seemed like a temporary arrangement at a time of war appears to have quietly shifted to become permanent. We’re now hearing that many checkpoints operate on a fixed schedule to allow people to leave for their workplaces and come back… this has now been absorbed into daily life as the new normal.
In Jerusalem, friends described a stretch of weeks marked by daily sirens, often in the middle of the night. The skies were lit with missiles. While strikes didn’t land in the city itself, the tension and fear reverberated through every home. One friend told us their 12-year-old had taken to naively photographing the sky, fascinated by it being all lit up with missiles, thankfully not fully realising the deadly nature of what’s flying overhead. Another was quietly making plans to send their frightened little children on an overland trip to stay with relatives abroad, since airspace was closed at the time.
Meanwhile, settler violence has escalated sharply. According to articles citing Israel’s Army Radio, settler attacks in the first half of 2025 rose by nearly 30% compared to last year. Palestinians have not only faced assaults, arson and raids, but in a further sign of just how extreme some of these groups have become, settlers have recently attacked Israeli army bases and security facilities too.
We had shipments stuck for weeks, one in a factory near Jenin, where staff couldn’t travel safely to work; another held up due to a lack of vessels and staff at Israeli ports. With regional escalation, many ships were diverted and port operations scaled back. Things have begun to ease over the past week and one container is now finally on the move, with the other one shortly to follow.
And throughout it all, people have been finding ways to keep going. One supplier, confined at home during the worst of the closures, told us they’d been sun-drying tomatoes on the roof to make the most of the season. Another shared that they’ve been harvesting grape leaves, an important source of income, particularly for women. And in one of the most striking examples of resolve and determination to keep going, a colleague began building a new home, making the most of the time and the hands available, with family members pitching in while travel was limited and other work had come to a standstill.
We hope that these glimpses help paint a fuller picture of the rapidly changing realities of daily life for our friends and suppliers in Palestine.
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