Book about two orphan children surviving in a war zone - Middle Eastern?

When I was in first or second grade, just about 20 years ago, I read a book about two orphan children, a girl and a boy (not related) trying to survive alone in a war zone. It was honestly very impactful as a child and I’m curious to find it now again as an adult, but I’m thinking it may have been kind of obscure because Google isn’t really helping.

She is only around 9-12 years old, definitely still a child herself and while searching an abandoned house she finds a little boy who was maybe 3 at most? Too young to talk. Deciding that she can’t leave him there to die, she takes the boy with her and now has to try and keep them both alive. I believe it took place somewhere in the Middle East because it was definitely a desert, but I didn’t know enough geography at the time to know that there’s desert anywhere else besides the Middle East and American southwest, and it definitely was not American.

One part that stood out was the girl searching an abandoned house (maybe where she found the boy? Maybe later, but the boy was definitely with her) and scooping the last bits of moldy rice out of the bottom of a cooking pot. She was struggling with being so hungry and not wanting to share the rice, while also being disgusted that she had to eat moldy food.

I have looked online and it’s not any of the popular titles that are coming up, and unfortunately I don’t remember really any more details that I’m sure of. The part about the rice is the most vivid thing that I’m absolutely certain of.