Thursday 04/1/2024

Yesterday I went to Rafah to see my friend. She was telling me not to come today if I was making the trip for her sake alone, that I should come another day to run all my errands at once. But I wanted to relive the memory of when we would meet in Gaza at the Brunch Cafe. Five minutes in the street with my friend. Five minutes where you want to say everything inside of you, but instead you find yourself saying nothing at all.

On the way to and from Rafah there are two houses on the side of the road that were bombed by the occupation forces during the aggression. I was sitting in the front seat of the car, on the same seat as another man I don’t know. He is called ‘excess weight’ by traffic regulations, but who cares about “excess weight” in this kind of situation. I glimpsed the first house that had written on its walls, “The children are still under the rubble,” and my eyes began leaking tears involuntarily. We then passed by another house, written on it, “Omar and Osama are still under the rubble.” Inside of me a storm swelled, all that we had been through, all the screams, my father being rescued, my father who had been under two walls, a couch, and a window grill, and my brother’s car. I remembered how the neighbors had wanted us to leave the house and my father, for fear that they would bomb the house. We remained, with broken shoulders, lifting rubble until we were able to get him out. 

Omar, Osama, and the children, with the house on top of them for days until this very moment, why hasn’t anyone gotten them out, if all they had to use were their nails? How can a neighbor leave his neighbor if the parents are unable? If the negligence of the municipality kills? 

My father longs for his old life and tries to return to it despite his injuries. He trains his fingers that don’t move, he makes an electric pot. Perhaps it would have been possible for Omar and Osama to be like him now. Perhaps the children could be playing with the other children at the hospital. 

In northern Gaza, occupation soldiers kidnapped an infant and took him to the occupied territories of historical Palestine. This was witnessed by another soldier, a friend of the kidnapper, who was killed in the confrontation in Gaza. The infant’s entire family was killed in cold-blood before kidnapping the child. They want to implant the barbaric zionist ideology in him.The whole world must know about this crime.    

During the morning hours, I awoke to people’s fear due to the occupation army advancing and laying siege to Maan School that is 2km away from the hospital. The Red Cross asked the displaced people at the school to evacuate to Rafah. They went to Rafah and then returned to the European Hospital because Rafah has no space. There is fear that the hospital will be besieged.