At the Rafah Zoo, dozens of displaced and impoverished Gazans are camped among cages where monkeys, parrots and lions starve as Israel’s military offensive rages on for 12 weeks.

The vast majority of the Gaza Strip’s 2.3 million people have been driven from their homes under relentless shelling that has reduced much of the Palestinian enclave to rubble. Many people are now crammed into the southern town of Rafah, living on street corners and in vacant lots.

At the private zoo, run by the Goma family, a series of tents have been set up near animal pens. Nearby a worker tries to hand-feed a weak monkey tomato slices.

Many of those who have taken refuge at the zoo are members of the extended Goma family who lived in various parts of the Gaza Strip before the war leveled their homes.

“There are many families that have been completely wiped out. Now all our family members live in this zoo,” says Adel Goma, who fled Gaza City. “Living among animals makes you more merciful even when warplanes fly overhead.”

Four monkeys have already died and a fifth is now so weak that it can’t even feed itself when food is available, the zoo owner said.

He also fears for his two lion cubs. “We feed them dry bread soaked in water just to keep them alive. The situation is truly tragic.”

The mother of the lion cubs has lost half her weight since the war began, and goes from daily meals of chicken to weekly rations of bread, he added.

A UN-backed report last week warned that the Gaza Strip is at risk of famine with the entire population facing acute levels of hunger. Israel cut off all imports of food, medicine, energy and fuel into the Palestinian enclave at the start of the war.

Although the Jewish state is now allowing aid into the enclave, security checks, congestion at drop-off points and difficulty moving through the rubble of a war zone are preventing the delivery of supplies. Many Palestinians say they don’t have food every day.

At the zoo, the lioness and her cubs lie listlessly in their cage, while small children play nearby.

Animals die and get sick every day, says Sofian Abdin, a veterinarian who has worked at the zoo. “Hunger, weakness, anemia. These problems are everywhere. There is no food.”