The phenomenon is known to everyone in the Gaza Strip, but the Hamas government tries to minimize it as much as possible.
It happens every day, sometimes even twice a day.
The authorities in the Gaza Strip refrain from publishing transparent and up-to-date data.
Most of the time they will try to round corners and rush to attribute the suicides to mental illnesses.
But in an era where everything is open and information passes through social networks within minutes, Hamas is less successful in hiding what the public in Gaza knows very well. Suicides and suicide attempts have become part of the social reality in the Gaza Strip.
We will not always know about them.
Usually we will receive vague messages from the police in Gaza, with a concise description along the lines of: "A 24-year-old found his death by hanging. An investigation has been opened."
The pair of words "suspected suicide" will almost never appear there.
lost will to live
Abu-Arabiya and his mother,
Hosni Abu-Arabiya, 26 years old, from the Shatti refugee camp west of Gaza, ended his life yesterday.
In the presence of his family members he set himself on fire before anyone at home could save him.
He was seriously injured and was taken to the hospital with high degree burns.
Half a day later he was pronounced dead.
"He burned himself because of the state of distress and poverty. While setting it on fire, he approached my arms and asked me to put out the fire, but I didn't have time, the flames reached me too," his mother recalled the fateful moments when she saw her son die in front of her eyes.
"Before that he asked his mother for a chicken, but she told him that the situation did not allow it," Hosni's sister told Palestinian media about the minutes leading up to the incident, and cried out to help her family members who are suffering from severe poverty.
Last week, 36-year-old Muhammad Abu-Rish set himself on fire in front of a bank branch in Gaza City, while begging for financial aid and an income allowance.
Abu-Rish lost his sight in 2017 during marches to the border fence, and has since lost his ability to work and became unemployed.
No salary - no life
In the video he uploaded to the Internet before the arson, he shared his situation and appealed to the Palestinian leaders for help.
"I sacrificed myself for Palestine and Al-Aqsa, and now I don't work. I have nothing left, I have no salary, no life," he said in despair in his last video testimony.
This was preceded by three other young Gazans who committed suicide in the last month.
One of them threw himself from the fifth floor, the other shot himself in the head, and the third set himself on fire.
In Gaza they talk about an average of about 50 suicide attempts a month.
The absolute majority of cases are in the young age group, and especially among men.
Without a future under Hamas rule: Gaza, photo: Reuters
"The mental pressures are created as a result of a state of despair. That young man feels that he has nowhere to go and nothing to strive for. He is in a big prison without fulfilling himself. In a situation where it is difficult to get food, there is no work, the family lives in great poverty, there is enormous distress and there is no hope that it will change - So what is life worth?"
say residents in the Gaza Strip.
In a situation where the unemployment rate in the Gaza Strip is about 50%, two thirds of the young people cannot find a job.
About half of the families are below the poverty line, and 80% of the residents rely on aid from UNRWA. "The permits issued by Israel do not apply to single young people.
They see how the world is progressing and they live like poor people without opportunities.
Families fall apart, the economic pressure affects them, they go into depression until they lose the will to live."
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