Hasnaa Abu Hasnah

A 42-year-old mother of six from the town of Jabalya in northern Gaza talks about being shot while venturing out to look for food, and suffering until she reached Egypt for treatment

When the war broke out, my husband and I stayed home with our six children, Baraa, 20, Nagham, 18, Malak, 15, Hala, 12, Rahaf, 9, and Mahmoud, 6, on the old Gaza Street in Jabalya. There was heavy bombing in the area, but we had nowhere else to go and we understood that despite the army's claims, nowhere was safe in the Gaza Strip.

The situation in northern Gaza, and especially in Jabalya, was very dangerous. In addition to the bombings there was shelling from tanks and we had a shortage of electricity, water and food. We went through a very difficult time.

Some of the time, we were at my parents' house next door. It was less scary to be together.

After the ceasefire was over, the situation in northern Gaza got much worse. There was no food. You couldn’t get hold of any flour or cooking gas. When the shops did have something, it was very expensive. A 25-kilo sack of flour was selling for more than 1,000 shekels (~270 USD).

We were hungry and had to walk long distances just to look for food. Sometimes, we couldn’t even leave the house because of the heavy bombing.

A lot of people in our area left their homes. In December, tanks invaded our street. It was very frightening and we hardly left the house. We felt that we were going to die at any moment. There were 100 of us gathered in one house – extended family and neighbors.

The bombing and shelling got very close to us, and there were snipers on the rooftops. There were bodies lying on the streets. We were very hungry and made pita bread over a bonfire from a bit of flour and barley we had left.

One day in late December 2023, we were starving and couldn’t hear any more bombing, so my sister Mahasen, 50, and I decided to go out and look for flour despite the danger. We thought the army had left the street and the neighborhood. We hoped they wouldn't harm us because we were women.

We left the house and walked about 100 meters. We met a guy and asked him how things were, and he said it was calm. But as soon as we started walking again, we took less than two steps when shots were fired at us from the roof of a house opposite ours. Mahasen and the guy ran away, and I fell down. Mahasen started screaming. I heard the guy tell her that I was dead, but she ran over to me even though there was still shooting. I told her to go home, because I felt like I was about to die. I told her not to come near me because I didn't want her to get hurt, but she insisted. She lay down on top of me. I kept telling her that I was about to die.

The neighbors saw us and called out to Mahasen to come back, but she refused to go back without me. She tried to drag me away but she couldn't, and I couldn't move. I felt paralyzed. Later, I found out that I was hit by one bullet in the neck and another in the back. Mahasen tried again and again to drag me away. After half an hour, my daughter Malak showed up with a white flag. She also tried to shield me with her body. Then my cousin Fatimah, 42, also came there with a white flag.

At that point, I blacked out. When I woke up, I was at home. My sister-in-law, who once took a first aid course, got a large white bandage and tightly bandaged the wound in my back to stop the bleeding. There were no means of communication and no ambulances. It was the most terrible night of our lives. I was very scared and in a lot of pain. Everyone was around me, my husband, the children and relatives. We all spent the night together in one room.

I stayed like that until the next day, when we decided to try and get to the hospital. Mahasen went outside with a white flag to look for a horse- or donkey-drawn cart. She came back with a cart, they lifted me onto it, and we went to al-Awdah Hospital in Jabalya R.C. At the hospital, they took X-rays and the doctor said I was paralyzed. He said my condition was irreversible and there was no treatment that could help.

I was in shock. I started screaming. Mahasen went to look for an ambulance to transfer me to a-Shifaa Hospital in Gaza City, but she was told there was no fuel for the ambulances. We left the hospital and my sister found a donkey cart again. We went to my sister Ahlam, 54, who also lives in Jabalya R.C. We stayed the night her place. I was in really bad condition. I could feel nothing in my body.

In the morning, my sister got a donkey cart again and we went to a-Shifaa Hospital. They said I was paralyzed, too. I stayed in the hospital for more than a month, from 29 December to 8 February 2024. The doctors and nurses only changed the bandages. They didn't operate on me or give me any other treatment. Mahasen stayed by my side the whole time. I was in intense pain all over my body and only got a few painkillers, because there was a shortage. There was also very little food and water, but I lost my appetite anyway and was exhausted from the suffering and pain, and tired of my condition.

While I was in a-Shifaa Hospital, the army surrounded and invaded it. There was no bread or water. Only after about 10 days, a vehicle with water supplies arrived at the back entrance to the hospital, and Mahasen went and got us water.

During that whole time, Mahasen tried to get me a referral for treatment in Egypt. She finally managed to get permits. I was taken by ambulance from the hospital to Rafah, and Mahasen came with me. When we got to the Netzarim checkpoint in central Gaza, we were detained by soldiers for about five hours. They checked us and took our photos, and took away our ID cards and then gave them back.

In the end, we crossed the checkpoint and continued on to Rafah, where I was kept at an American field hospital from 8 February to 8 April 2024, because it took time to coordinate my leaving Gaza.

At the American hospital, I got painkillers and physiotherapy. The feeling in my body started to come back and I managed to move my legs, but I lay on my back the whole time and was in a very bad mental state. I cried day and night. I felt that I would never walk again.

I left the Gaza Strip with Mahasen on 8 April 2024. Now I’m in Egypt, but I haven’t had surgery yet and haven’t received any treatment. I need surgery to remove the bullets lodged in my body, in my neck and in the seventh vertebra in my back. Since December I’ve been lying on my back in bed. I’ve started suffering from pressure sores on my back, as well as diarrhea and occasional constipation.

I really hope they operate on me soon and that I’ll be able to walk again. I want to go back to Gaza and be with my husband and children, who stayed in the north. They’re far away and my heart aches for them. There is hunger and bombing there all the time. I’m scared something will happen to them.

* Testimony given over the phone to B’Tselem field researcher Olfat al-Kurd on 14 April 2024