Voices from Gaza

Since then, I've been alone in the world. I lost my family. I have no home and no future. I cry every day. I go to sleep alone and wake up lonely and lost. I came back from Turkey a month before the war started because of my family. My mother really wanted me to get married. We hoped the war would end and we’d go back to our lives, but they killed my mother, my father and everyone else in my family. They killed everyone. That's how I became an orphan, alone. My life is black now. I don't think I'll ever get over the trauma.

I have no family left. We were just starting out as a family. We were happy together. On 13 October, we celebrated our first wedding anniversary. All I have left are our two wedding rings, which I’m keeping. I have no other mementos. All the photos and videos are gone. Our clothes, my wife’s and daughter’s belongings, all gone. My house in Gaza City was completely destroyed by the bombing. It was bombed just one day before I left the city. All my memories with my family are gone forever.

we heard a loud explosion and the roof of the building and its pillars collapsed on us. Everything was dark and full of dust. Hanan was still holding my hand when a block of concrete fell on her, and I couldn’t move. I screamed out to the children and only Ibrahim answered. He said, “Dad, I’m going to die.” I told him to recite the Shahadatain. I shouted for help, hoping someone would hear me and save my wife and children. I called out to Hanan, but she didn’t respond.

I haven’t showered in ten days because there isn’t always water and when there is we save it to clean the toilets. A six-liter jug of water, which is not really drinkable, costs five shekels (~ USD 1.4). That’s a lot of money for us. My son Yusef, 17, walks about a kilometer to a place where you can fill up water and waits in line for hours just to fill two jugs for which you have to pay. We use one for drinking, even though it is not clean water, and the other for bathing. The children are still wearing the same clothes they wore when we left home and we don’t have enough water to wash them.

Because of the hunger, my wife can barely nurse our nine-month-old son, Yamen, and baby formula is nowhere to be found either. A little while ago, we managed to buy a kilo of dates for NIS 40 (~ USD X), which has been helping us survive. We live off what we manage to get - a little rice, a little corn we ground, and also barley, which is meant for feeding farm animals. The price of barley has also gone crazy. Now even the barley ran out and people have started grinding bird and rabbit food. But there is not much of that either. There is no food for humans or for animals.

I miss our old life, before the war, without all the bombings and killings. We’re exhausted. We’re broken and have no strength left. In one of the bombings, I lost a lot of people form my family and my parents were spared by luck alone. Now, the military might invade Rafah and force us out again. I don't know where else we can run. We’ve been displaced four times. I don’t know what fate awaits us.

I was kept there with my hands in metal handcuffs day and night, and sometimes my legs, too. Sometimes they hung me by one hand and left me like that for three or four hours until I fainted. I couldn’t move the other hand because my shoulder must have been broken from the beatings when the platinum came out [...] I was taken to the interrogation room about 5 or 6 times and asked about my friends and neighbors and whether I had undergone military training. All they gave us to eat was a slice of bread, a cucumber and a small piece of cheese. Now and then we got some tuna fish and a bit of water to drink.

I’ve started having diarrhea and vomiting, and my body has become weak. About a month ago, I started getting stomach aches and swelling, and tingling in different parts of my body. I started throwing up everything I ate, even the water I drank. After this went on for about two weeks, I went to the Kuwaiti hospital here in Rafah. They ran tests and diagnosed me with hepatitis. The doctor said it was due to lack of hygiene and told me to be more careful and also to eat healthy. He said there was no cure and it would go away on its own if I was careful.

They put me in a jeep again, with other detainees, and transferred us to a large structure that had a rough floor, like concrete, and a tin roof. The sides were open and it was very, very cold. There were a lot of detainees there. When we got there, they blindfolded us and ordered us to kneel down on our knees. I was held there for 35 days, and all that time we were not allowed to move or speak to each other. We ate and slept with our hands tied and our eyes covered.

Every day, the soldiers ordered us to sit on our knees from 5:00 A.M. until the evening. We ate and drank with our hands tied in front of us. If we looked sideways, or even spoke to one another, they would punish us and make us stand with our hands raised for about three hours. On top of that, they didn’t let us go to the bathroom when we asked, and they didn’t always let us pray, either.

The whole way, the children cried from hunger, thirst, and fear at the sight of the bodies in the streets. We walked to a military checkpoint south of a-Zeitun neighborhood, along with a lot of other people who were carrying white flags. When we got to the checkpoint, the soldiers swore at us over loudspeakers: “Go, animals.” We kept walking until the entrance to a-Nuseirat Refugee Camp. I suffered from severe pain in my legs the whole way, because I have a herniated disc and had surgery two months before the war.

I was supposed to go back to Tel Hashomer on 8 October for 30 days of biological treatment, two pills a day, to prevent a relapse, and for a pelvic joint transplant on 10 October. Then came the Hamas attack and the war began. Since then, I haven’t been able to go to the hospital and haven’t received the treatment, because the medication isn’t available in Gaza. I’m very stressed and afraid that the cancer will return. I’m not under observation, not getting my treatment and can’t go to the hospital.

The shelling grew worse and I was worried about Adham [my son] and Diab [my nephew], so I went out looking for them. On the way, I was hit in the hand by a shot from an Israeli drone. I heard Adham and Diab shouting for help, but there was heavy shelling and I couldn’t reach them, even though they were about five meters away from me.

They blindfolded me with a piece of cloth and handcuffed me in front with white zip ties.There were six of us girls. One of the girls was in pain. The soldiers asked me to translate what she was saying into English, and I translated that she thought she’d miscarried. One of the soldiers said, ‘Oh my God.’ A doctor came in and covered her with a blanket. She was told to put on shoes, so she wouldn’t be so cold. The soldiers told us to sleep, but it was too cold and we were lying handcuffed on rocks, so we weren’t really able to.

A few days ago, I took Wisam to the doctor here in the camp. He prescribed eight rounds of inhalation, one a day. I took Wisam to the European Hospital east of Khan Yunis, and he got one round of inhalation. Then we came back to the IDP camp. I didn’t want to stay there because I was afraid the hospital would be bombed, so he didn’t get the rest of the treatment.

After the war started, my milk dwindled and I could barely nurse Alma anymore. I had to get formula and give her two bottles a day. At first she did okay on the formula, but then we couldn't get that brand anymore, and when we switched brands she didn’t respond well [...] She’s lost weight, she coughs a lot, and has diarrhea and vomits. Sometimes she runs a high fever.

They kept me lying on the ground in our garden for about half an hour. Then they took me like that, naked, to another house in the neighborhood, about 150 meters from my house. They took my photo and gave me a number (058793).

We’ve been here for a month and a half now, and we’re still 32 people in one tent. We’re very cold and have almost no winter clothes. We sit close to each other to keep warm. Some people in the family have no shoes, and every few people share a pair of flip-flops. The crowding is unbearable, and there is absolutely no privacy. It’s always noisy. All of this makes the stress worse.

In the evening, they took me and about 15 other women they arrested to another place. They told us we were in an Israeli military detention facility. Every time I moved, I got hit on the head. Every time I heard soldiers’ voices, I was afraid I’d get hit again. They kept cocking their weapons to scare us. Every time I heard that, I recited the “shahadatein” because I was sure they were going to shoot me. Our hands were tied in zip ties the whole time.