The Apollo of Gaza: Hamas's Ancient Bronze Statue

Wearing shorts and a mask, and armed with a net, Jouda Ghurab climbed down a portion of Gaza Strip beach made steep by years of pounding waves, and dove into the Mediterranean. By his telling, it was Aug. 16 of last year, a Friday just after Ramadan. Ghurab, a fisherman, is 26, and has a wife and two sons. He left school at 13 and has been fishing since he was 17. He seeks his catch close to shore, either in a rowboat or by swimming out to patches of submerged rock. When the weather permits, he earns 20 to 30 Israeli shekels ($5.70 to $8.60) a day catching and selling a mix of sardines, squid, and bigger fish such as the prized gilt-head sea bream. He has enormous muscular hands and wears a close-cropped, black beard.

Deir al-Balah, where Ghurab lives and fishes, is about 8 miles southwest of Gaza City, just 10 miles up the coast from Egypt. For a while Ghurab made money digging some of the smuggling tunnels under the Egyptian border and helped shuttle contraband—from washing machines to hives of Egyptian honeybees—but that money dried up when Egypt cracked down on trafficking.