My family was in
We are safe. We do not smell burned flesh, hear cries of agony or see before us military planes. We view from a distance, but feel none of the anxiety and melancholy that the rest of our family feels in the besieged coastal strip.
Scattered throughout the refugee camps of Khan Younis, Beit Lahya and Jabalya, my relatives are living through another war. We try to call each and every relative to ascertain their safety, but mostly to see whether or not they are still living. The telephone networks were either busy or not working at all. We forgot that
Thirteen years ago my father moved back to
We call Beit Lahya. No answer.
After failed attempts to contact my family in Jabalya (due to
Finally, we decide to call our family in Khan Younis. My cousin’s mobile is working. The Jawal towers appear to be intact in Khan Younis. Mohamad, a 26-year-old father of two, works as an executive director for the Palestinian Student Care Association, a non-profit organization that promotes formal education to Palestinians in
Comforted to hear my voice, like a prisoner receiving a call from the outside world, he asks me how I am doing. Baffled by his question, I don’t know: is he is being earnest or polite? I answered by repeating his question.
"We haven’t been able to leave the camp since the ground invasion began. Israeli tanks are blocking all entrances to the camp," Mohamad says, "Of course, nobody has been to work or school for the past ten days, we are all staying in our homes at the moment."
80 percent of Gazans cannot support themselves and are dependent on humanitarian assistance, according to a report by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).
"Right now, flour and sugar are not available," Mohamad is weary, "If we want bread we have to be at the bakery by 5 am, and all we get is 1 or 2 loaves."
Food supplies are depleting and with Israel’s complete restriction over movement into and out of Khan Younis, many residents are coping with what little they have, resorting to tediously baking their own bread using the taboon, an oven made of clay, which requires long hours of watching the bread to make sure each side is equally cooked.
Thinking of Mohamad’s children I ask him how they are coping with sights and sounds of death.
Mohamad said his 6-year-old son Munir stands at the window and pretends to shoot down Israeli apaches and fighter jets that fly overhead. His two-year-old daughter Saja cries every time she hears renewed sounds of bombardment and runs to hide.
"Yesterday we got electricity at 8 p.m. and we immediately turned on the television to watch the news. My children are frightened not just by the sounds of the bombing and gunfire, but by the images they see on the news. They see the Israeli tanks in the camp and they correlate the tank with death."
Mohamad says he doesn’t believe that any outside government will intervene, especially that of Arab countries.
"They [Arab governments] have never helped in the past, so why would they help us now? This is something natural that we have come to accept. The Egyptian government won’t even open Rafah for Palestinians in need of urgent medical care without permission from
I asked him if he would leave
"Of course not," he says, "If I die, I want to die here in my country and most Palestinians you ask will say the same thing."
Mohamad laughs into the phone. He asks me if I know why he is laughing. Though I said nothing, there was the thought that maybe war hysteria had finally begun to set in.
"I’m laughing because this is a very complex situation," he says, "Every party wants to govern Palestinians, whether it’s Hamas, Fatah or Islamic Jihad. They all look out for their own self-interests.
I turn off the phone and turn to the news frenetically searching for some sort of meaning to all this bombardment. With the help of the press displaying the war as something needed to create security or harmony for
Sousan Hammad is a writer and former Nation intern. She is also a coordinator for the Houston Palestine Film Festival and can be reached at [email protected]
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