Author: admin

Solidarity and other things

Since I arrived in Rafah, I’ve witnessed all types of solidarity; welcoming support. Hundreds of families opened their homes for displaced people from Gaza and the North, for free, sharing all that they have with them. Abu Khaled Abdelal, the man who received me with my mother, was no exception, hundreds like him. Hundreds of landowners gave their land for displaced people to build their tents. Hearing such stories makes you feel good, relieved; you believe that humanity is still there despite the war, despite the fact that these homeowners are also suffering the war, the famine, the agony and the daily search for food and basic needs.

I said hundreds. In Rafah, there are thousands of homes that are not the same. Again like in every crisis, in every war, there are always the ‘war advantage takers’. Many homes are provided for free, many other homes are rented for huge amounts of money and those who have the ability to pay are very limited. Normal rental price in Rafah is $100 – $150. Some ask for $1000, like the homeowner who rented me this flat. Some even ask for much more.

This is only one image of ‘war advantage takers’. Since mid-November, some local businesses were allowed by the Israelis to import food items and all that they brought was sold at 10 times the original price. Moreover, they did not think about what people need, they thought about what is more profitable for them. While there is bread flour scarcity, they import biscuits, selling a $0.5 biscuit bar for $2. Instead of importing cooking oil, they import the cheapest cans of juice, selling them for 5 or 6 times the original price. Those businesses are an extra burden on the starving people. And while the authorities have collapsed – no monitoring, no accountability – they do what they want.

 

Writing Again

For a while I’ve been trying to write but something is pushing me back. Am I busy? Yes, but over the last days I was over-busy yet I was able to write.

In Rafah I could not write more than 5 or 6 times. Something prevented me. I think the situation around me here in Rafah is beyond words or description. When one million people are squeezed and pushed into less than 5km square, the image cannot be reflected in words.

Thousands of tents with thousands of families everywhere, in every empty space, in the streets, on the pavements, without water, without toilets, without food, without blankets, without beds or mattresses, without privacy and without dignity. Walking around I can see nothing but misery and heartbreak. Thousands of children in the streets, thousands of street sellers and the majority are children and young people. Mosques, almost every hour, are calling out names of lost children looking for their families. Crowds and crowds. Walking 100 metres takes more than 30 minutes. Using a car is impossible and there is no fuel anyway. Some cars are using cooking oil instead of fuel making the price of cooking oil increase by treble the original price, like everything in the market. Scarcity in all types of basic needs.

10 days since Abeer arrived with her family and I found them this terrible place, a closed store, like a prison cell. At least they have a roof above their heads. I left them there and went back to Abu Khaled Abdelal’s home to stay there with my mother. The second day I passed by them, brought them some food and went to the UNRWA clinic in Tel Al Sultan in west Rafah. The UN agencies are taking a space there for humanitarian coordination meetings. I went to one of these meetings. No point in mentioning anything about it – complete catastrophe and helplessness – all UN agencies are unable to help or do what they should be doing. UNICEF, the WHO, the World Food Program and many other agencies and International Humanitarian Organisations – they do their best and their best meets almost 5% of the real needs of the people. They are weak, they have no power over the Israelis, to oblige them to allow humanitarian aid to enter Gaza, so they coordinate and distribute whatever the Israelis allow into Gaza.

I went out, walking, in the place that has become the most crowded spot on Earth. Tel Al Sultan neighbourhood in Rafah – almost half a million in 1km square – and in this crowd, from nowhere, someone is calling my name. It is the oldest son of my brother who I left in Deir Al Balah at Al Aqsa Hospital.

• What’s up?

• They are bombing beside the hospital and sent messages to people to leave. We left yesterday, we spent the night in the street near Alnajjar Hospital in Rafah.

• Where are your mother, father and brothers now?

• They are still there.

• What are you doing here?

• Some people advised me to come to Tel Al Sultan to look for a place.

• Ok. I will leave you for now, I will call you back.

I did not know what to do  I must find something. I start calling friends, looking for a tent. In the afternoon, a friend working for a local organisation called me to say that there is a small tent available.

I went to him and called my nephew. He came and took the tent. I gave him some food and some money, asking him to find a place to install the tent and call me back about the place he found.

The next three days trying to call my brother, his sons, could not reach them. I got so worried. Finally, he appeared, for three days he was busy looking for a spot in Rafah to install the tent. He had not found a place yet. He was also busy with his mother’s dialysis treatment which takes hours and hours of waiting as all the dialysis patients are gathered in one hospital in Rafah.

Back to Sawarha again

On Thursday I went to Sawarha with some supplies for my wife and her family – some food and hygiene items.

On Friday Abeer called, very anxious and panicked. The bombing, shelling and air strikes did not stop in Nuseirat near Sawarha. People started to evacuate from there. There was random bombing near the house, they did not sleep. The news is that the sea road is safe from north to south but no-one is allowed to move from south to north or the middle area. 

They can’t leave alone. Our car is there but with no fuel. I spent all day looking for 6 litres of benzene, just enough to drive from Sawarha to Rafah in the south. Knowing the risk I am going to take by going north, I did not think for a single minute not to go. They can’t manage, they are 10: 3 children, 4 women, an old man and a young man, paralysed with fear – I know that he won’t be able to help. Could not secure the fuel until 9pm, never mind the price, (normal price is $2/litre, I paid $34/litre for 6 litres).

A friend of Abu Khaled, his business partner, a man I had never met before these days, offered to take me in his mini-jeep to help bring the family and whatever belongings we can bring such as mattresses, blankets, food, cooking gas and a gas cylinder and the gas itself, some kitchen items. If we don’t bring these things we will not find any at all in Rafah.

I can never thank him enough. He knew the risk. He could lose his car in a bombing, yet he did not hesitate. He even said that it was full of diesel so I shouldn’t worry about it.

Driving very early Saturday morning at 6am, the main road between Rafah and Khan Younis is completely empty. Avoiding Khan Younis city as there is the military invasion there, we turn west 2km before Khan Younis towards the sea road.

Since I was here the day before yesterday, new homes and buildings were destroyed. Parts of the roads were almost blocked by fallen rubble. But we managed.

Along the sea road, some movement – all kinds of cars, vehicles, trucks, jeeps, full of belongings and people all going south. Some people are in the streets. Driving and expecting the worst, but no choice. We continue. By Deir Al Balah, the city in the middle area, huge crowds of people are blocking the road, moving everywhere, looking for something called safety and shelter. Many can’t find it.

Normally it is only 22km from Rafah to Sawarha and takes 30 minutes to drive but today is different. I arrived at 8.25am. They were asleep after a long night of bombing, shelling and heavy shooting shaking the house all night. They fell asleep out of tiredness and fear. The good thing was they had prepared everything. All the stuff they need to take was packed and ready to be loaded on the cars. I put the benzene in our car, packed the stuff, distributed the people in the 2 cars and started the trip to Rafah. Rafah, where there is no place at all any more.

Rafah, the last city in the south of Gaza with borders with Egypt, inhabited by 200,000 with poor infrastructure, similar to all Gaza Strip cities and camps. Now hosting one million two hundred thousand people. Don’t ask how. For sure not in the houses – they are completely full. Wherever you look, in every empty space, at every roadside: tents, all kinds of tents, tents (good ones) received from humanitarian aid organisations, tents made from plastic and nylon sheets, tents made from pieces of fabric. More than 1 million people in tents, without toilets. People, mainly women, knock on doors asking to use the toilet, men are in lines at the mosques waiting to use the toilets. Without any facilities, in front of some tents, people make small fires to heat or cook. Hundreds of families on the streets did not receive a tent. They don’t have money to buy wood and plastic sheets to make their own – these cheap materials became more expensive than gold for poor people. 

Here in Rafah I must bring my wife and her family. I think I was an angel in another life – I don’t know. I don’t really believe that.  But I was planning a meeting with my staff who are providing psycho-social support in shelter-schools for children. I was planning to meet them on Saturday to hear from them and to provide them with some support, to check if there is anything I can do to facilitate their work. So I called one of them to ask him to postpone the meeting for another day. I’m busy bringing my wife. 

This wonderful colleague from Rafah started to call people, looking for a place for them to stay. I was driving back, near Deir Al Balah, when he called me to say that he’d found a store, 6m by 2.5m square, including a toilet. It is in the centre of Rafah, in the middle of the main market. What luck! It is a 15 minute walk from where I am staying at Abu Khaled’s home. Adjacent to Al Awda Hospital in Rafah. We arrived around 2pm. In front of the store, a bombed house, rubble in the street. The owner had brought some workers to clean up. The door of the store was damaged. He brought a blacksmith to fix it. The family waited in the cars for an hour until the place was almost ready. Some works still need to be done inside, never mind, Abeer’s brother will do it. They were exhausted. I brought them some food and left. I could not stay any longer, I should go and check on my mother.

Two hours later, I passed by to see how they are. For sure no-one is happy. They are all so tired. Even our dog Buddy was quiet, sitting in the corner, and did not come to me when I arrived as he would usually. The place is hell. Not good, not comfortable, no light, some candles, yet a million times better than a tent on the street. No complaints.

I left them around 5pm. It gets dark, I could not stay. I must be beside my mother now. 

Next day….another story…

Agony

Today I went to Sawarha to see my wife Abeer and bring her some food and hygiene items which became very difficult to secure in Sawarha. I left home at 8.30 am.

In Rafah, the crowds are unbelievable. Moving, walking 100 metres takes at least 10 minutes. A city of 200,000 inhabitants with very weak infrastructure, received 1 million people. (I will late about Rafah at another time).

Looking for a taxi to Sawarha. The normal cost of one is $1.5. The first taxi asked for $150. I left him for another one, arguing the price, finally there was no-one cheaper than $65 with the condition that he would take other passengers on the way. I have no choice. We start moving. 30 minutes to get out of the city toward Khan Younis but not really reaching Khan Younis as there is the Israeli invasion there. Before reaching Khan Younis City, the driver rook roads that I never knew about, until we reached the coast road. 

Tents everywhere, people everywhere, street sellers of food items received from humanitarian aid are everywhere, making the road busy and crowded. The car on many occasions moved at the speed of a man walking.  We reached Deir Al Balah, then Zawaida, then Sawarha. A distance of less than 3km took more than 1hour and 20 minutes. A long line of cars, trucks, donkey carts, all types of vehicles are full of people, mattresses, stuff, cooking gas cylinders, jerrycans for water, bread flour, vehicles full to bursting, stuff tied with ropes, all are moving to the south, evacuated from Nuseirat. The image is like Judgement Day. People look very tired, very desperate, very unclean. Men are unshaven, young children crying everywhere, very afraid. You could feel the fear. You could touch the fear. They are going to Rafah, not knowing what they are going to do there. Everybody knows that Rafah is completely full; not only the houses, buildings or the public institutions but the streets, the parks, the side roads are completely full with tents and people. They are escaping from the bombing and the military invasion. They are running for their lives but have no idea where and what could happen to them. 

Some volunteers were trying to help facilitate the traffic but it was an almost impossible mission. Some cars stopped due to engine problems; no side roads to push them into out of the line of traffic. The road also passes by shelter-schools on the sea road which makes it more difficult; hundreds of street sellers in front of the schools, thousands of people move in and out, blocking the road. I am worried about being late. I must be back at 1pm otherwise my mother will worry.

From Rafah to Sawarha normally takes 20 minutes even with a normal traffic jam. Arrived at 11.30. Sawarha was quiet. It is 2.5km from the centre of Nuseirat, but the invasion continues. The Israeli army started the invasion in a small part of Nuseirat 2 weeks ago. Now they’ve almost invaded the whole camp, leaving behind them huge destruction and hundreds of people killed. Bombing, shelling, heavy shooting. 

I agreed with the taxi driver to take me to Sawarha and bring me back to Rafah, so I met Abeer for less than 10 minutes. Checked on her and the family, everyone is still alive but no-one is ok.

Buddy, my dog, was so happy to see me. I was so happy to see him too. He kept jumping on me and running around. I don’t want to leave. iIwant to stay with my wife and my dog. I want to go back home. I want to settle down, to lay down on my bed or sit on my balcony with my wife, my daughter and my dog as we used to to every evening, having some coffee. I need some rest and tranquility. Nothing more.

I discussed with Abeer the plan of their arrival to Rafah. Her parents completely refuse to leave until they see all the people in the area leaving. Abeer is unable to leave them alone, I don’t know what to do. What a complex situation. Trying to convince them is not helping. I understand that they are tired of moving and being displaced. They are too old for more agony. It is their only way to show that they are giving up. Time is running out. It will take me at least another 2 hours back to Rafah, to my mother. I left the stuff at the front door and left with the agreement of Abeer to communicate further on the mobile. 

The journey back to Rafah was the same, the same crowd, the same sad people, the same traffic of displaced people in cars and vehicles full of their basic needs, full of hundreds of street sellers of food aid items, full of agony.

Abo Khaled Abdel’Al

A 50 year old man, tall, big, fat; looks like a giant but with a babyface. He is from a very respected family in Rafah. Started his life as a construction worker in Israel, then a hairdresser, but he was an ambitious man. He had a dream to one day be a businessman. He followed his dream and he became what he wanted to be. Today he is a well-known and respected businessman in the Gaza Strip.

He lives with his family in a big house. Three floors, the first floor is a big living room with one bedroom and bathroom.

His front yard is as long as the house. He made a place where he receives guests; a fire for making tea and coffee is alight from 6am until 9pm. The door to the front yard is always open; any person passing by is invited to rest and drink tea. He receives hundreds of people every day.

The family live on the second and third floor. The basement of the home is a big storage area. He is a man with principles, honest, respectful and generous.

Horror and relief

It is 6 days without any news about my brother’s and sister’s families. Since my nephew told me that the building behind their house was bombed and collapsed on their home. No news about whether they were inside or had left before. I did not stop trying to reach them but communication between the south and north is cut.

Today more horrific news: in the morning, calling my daughter in Lebanon, which is much easier than calling my wife in the middle area, she told me that her mother, my wife, Abeer, is in a panic. She saw a video of an injured person taken to Al Aqsa Hospital who died before reaching the operating room and she believes it is her brother. She shared the video with me. There was no way to tell who this person was; his face was mostly covered; his body is similar to my wife’s brother, but wait!! My wife’s brother is in Gaza City, even if he is injured he won’t be brought to Al Aqsa Hospital in the middle area. The road between Gaza City and the middle area has been completely cut for more than a month and a half. 

Calling Abeer, can’t reach her. She told Salma that she is going to Al Aqsa Hospital to check. I called my nephew, the son of my other brother who took refuge in the aforementioned hospital with his family. After several attempts I finally reached him. I asked him to go to the morgue to check if Abeer’s brother is among the martyrs there. He calls back after an hour. He says that the 30 bodies that arrived yesterday and this morning are without names and he does not know my wife’s brother so he could not help. Yet he continues talking. He says that finally he got news form Gaza City; my brother and sister with their families are safe. They left home a day before the invasion of their area and before the bombing of the building behind their home. 

• How do you know?

A neighbour who had a Cellcom communication sim (Israeli communication company), called him and told him that my brother went to a shelter-school far from the area and that my sister went to another shelter-school in the north.

I keep calling Abeer with no success. Contacted Selma. Finally Abeer had called her and told her that the body she believed to be her brother is not her brother, yet she had no news from her brother for more than a month.

Some relief after a time of heaviness and horror. Keeping hope. 

Day and night

I wake at 6.30 am every day. My host is amazing. At 6 he is in the side yard of the house lighting the fire, preparing breakfast and hot tea. I am not allowed to leave without breakfast. He asks about my mother, repeatedly asking if she or I need anything.

Leaving at 8 am for the office of my organisation, Ma’an Development Agency, in Rafah. Full house, people from everywhere, from many associations that have no offices, trying to follow up on the interventions they are making for people. 

Rafah, which used to have 170,000 inhabitants is now hosting more than a million, at least half of them on the streets, building tents from plastic sheets which do not prevent cold or rain. But this is what is available. The market in the town centre is over-busy. It feels like the million people are gathered in this town centre. 

I’ve realised that there is plenty of work that we do besides providing psychosocial support; we distribute food, we build kitchens and distribute hot meals, we distribute hygiene and dignity kits to displaced people, we distribute water tanks to shelters and random collectives of displaced people, we distribute clothes for children, we are trying to bring in better tents for people, we employ staff to clean the schools and mainly the toilets on a daily basis. All of this, as well as what the UNRWA do, as well as what all the humanitarian organisations offer, meets almost zero of people’s real needs. With the stoppage of normal life, no-one has any kind of income in Gaza, all that people look for is shelter and food. 2.2 million people. But above all, people are in need of safety and dignity. It is not there anymore. 

I got involved in all of this as a team member of Ma’an emergency team. I have no chance to think about anything. It’s like a bees’ cell. But I can’t stay at the office more than 5 hours; I must go back to my mother who gets panicked if she doesn’t find me around her at 2 pm.

Back home, I go directly to be with my mother who must blame me for being late whether I am early or late. I provide her with what she needs, then try to rest.

Rest!!! I hate it. While trying to rest, thinking starts. What has happened to my brother and sister’s families? Are they alive? Did they survive? Maybe some died and some survived. My wife Abeer and her family – no contact for the last 3 days. I will go to Nuseriat tomorrow to check on them. I wanted to go earlier but could not.

When will this nightmare end? Does it have an end? What kind of end? What will life look like when it ends, with completely destroyed cities and towns? Who is going to be the ruling authority? A new Israeli military occupation? The corrupt authority of Ramallah? Hamas again?

As much as I try to get busy with the family hosting me in order to avoid thinking, night is coming. Dark thoughts invading my head, falling asleep I don’t know how, and waking up in the morning so tired as if I did not sleep or rest at all. 

Terror and torture

After two days in Rafah I relax, I’m more involved in work and I don’t worry about my mother for the 5 hours I leave her at Abu Khaled’s home. This wonderful family who had never met me yet received me and my mother, treating us as part of their family, caring for my mother when I am out and even when I am in. 

Communication has been cut for one and half days. Could not reach my wife and her family. Strikes and bombing are concentrated against the middle area; mainly Bureij, Maghazi and Nuseirat where I left my wife. Words do not help to explain how I feel. Trying to reach her family by mobile, trying thousands of times every day. It doesn’t work.

My brother and sister with their families and other relatives, around 25 people, remain in Gaza City. They did not want to leave home. 5 families gathered in 2 apartments in the middle of Saftawi Street, north of Gaza City, where for more than a month communication has been cut. I know nothing about them; they know nothing about me.

Today my brother’s son called me from Al Aqsa Hospital where he and his brother, his father – my eldest brother – and his mother took refuge in a plastic tent in the courtyard of the hospital. HIs voice was not normal:

• I’ve been trying to call you since this morning. (It was 16.50)

• What’s up? How is your mother? Your father, your brother?

• Uncle Sofian, Aunt Taghrid…

• What about them? What happened?

• (Crying) I don’t know.

• What do you mean? Please tell me

• I met a neighbour from where uncle lives, he said the tall building behind their home was bombed and fell onto the house. The house collapsed and was completely damaged.

• What about your uncle, your aunt, their families? Were they inside? Did they leave before?(begins crying)

• Please answer me.

• I don’t know.

• What do you mean? Ask the man.

• He doesn’t know – 

The call ended. I tried calling his mobile again and again, his brother’s and his father’s mobiles.

It is 10.25pm and I am still trying to reach anyone to know anything.

The third displacement, to Rafah

Finally, I must decide – my wife Abeer’s brother and his family, Abeer’s female cousins and their daughter arrived at my parents-in-law’s home. A full house of women and children, some of us must move to Rafah, the next destination after Gaza City and Nuseirat. They are all one family. I am the outsider. I decided to take my mother and leave. Abeer decided to stay with her parents and sisters. Now we have to separate. I don’t know how long for. I don’t know if we are going to meet again. 

Finding a taxi to Rafah was not easy, I had to walk from Sawarha to Salahaldeen Road where taxis are found, 5km walking, in fact almost running. It was 14.40, dark falls in less than 3 hours. I must be in Rafah before dark. Dark is another fear, another uncertainty.

Found a taxi, asking for lots of money. No choice, I agreed. $100, almost 20 times the normal price. We drove back to Sawarha, I loaded our stuff, 2 mattresses, 2 blankets, 2 bags of clothes. A half full cylinder of cooking gas enough for 2 weeks.

I did not know even then where to go in Rafah. I called a friend there asking him to find me a place. I know that I am giving him an impossible task. More than 1 million people displaced to Rafah, a city of less than 100,000 people now hosting 10 times the original population.

From Nuseirat taking the sea road, anxious, not comfortable, the Israeli navy on the horizon, we heard many stories of shelling and killing of people on the sea road. Arriving at Khan Younis, west of Khan Younis, Mawasi area, the area which is mostly uninhabited, agricultural land. We used to drive and spend our weekends there running away from the crowds and noise of the city, Gaza City. It is unbelievable how it has become, thousands and thousands of people on the main road, which became similar to a flea market, selling some food items, second-hand clothes and other stuff. On both sides of the main road, hundreds of tents made from cheap plastic sheets.

Arrived in Rafah, same image, same situation doubled. Crowds everywhere, tents everywhere, small sellers everywhere. People moving all ways, back and forth, huge chaos. Dirt, garbage everywhere, destruction everywhere, bombed houses everywhere. Grey and black are the dominant colours, as if the colours of life have been taken away from Gaza. Trees in the street are all cut, people cut them to use for fire. No green colour anymore, even the sky in this season hides its blue colour and shows its grey, gloomy colour.

Some of my friends who arrived in Rafah earlier are in tents in the streets, tents that don’t prevent the cold or rain, but this was their only option, their only possibility. What will I do with my 83 year old bedridden mother?

Calling my friend all the way and the connection is not going through. More than 60 times trying until finally it works. He asked me to come to his family house in Rafah. I know already they have no place, no room for any more people. I know they are hosting more than 100 people there. 

Arrived at his place and he received me with a big smile.

• Are you lucky or are you lucky?
• Why? What?
• I asked a friend who has good connections to look for an apartment for rent. He is a wealthy business man but he could not find any place for rent.
• So, what is the news then?
• He asked me again, ‘Who wants the place?’ and I told him it’s for my friend and his bedridden mother. He decided to host you and your mother in his home.
• Really?! I don’t want to bother people.
• Don’t worry, let’s go.

He took a ride with us, guiding the driver to his friend’s address.

Arrived at a fancy building of three floors, with a side yard with a decorated, wooden roof.

The man was there waiting for us with a big smile, very friendly and welcoming.

He asked his sons to unload my stuff, they did not let me carry anything. The ground floor had a big living room and one bedroom with a toilet beside it. The man said: ‘I hope this is ok for you.’

I was speechless. Could not express my feelings of appreciation but kept saying: ‘Thank you, thank you.’

I put my mother to bed. They brought food and offered for me to take a shower. A shower? Wow. A hot shower. The first time for three months, since then, I have been washing my body using a plastic can with cold water.

My mother was so tired from the journey. She slept.

After the shower I went to the side yard. There were some men around the fire, brewing a pot of tea. We sat, chatted until 8pm. Then we all went to bed. They did not stop asking me if I needed anything, they did not stop saying ‘ Your mother is our mother, you should not worry about her.’

I slept. My mother slept.

Fear, loneliness

Since the start of this brutal massacre and killing of the Gazan people, I was always afraid. The kind of fear that you think you control by caring for your family, by keeping busy, securing their needs, by following up on the work of my colleagues, the counsellors and social workers at the shelters, by writing my diaries and sharing them with friends around the world. The kind of fear that you keep in and ignore, although all reasons for fear and panic are there – the random bombing, shelling, shooting, destruction, the number of people killed and injured reaching more than 27,000 killed and more than 54,000 injured. Yet I keep it deep inside.

Since yesterday my feelings are different. My fear is different. Since the Israeli army ordered people in Bureij Camp and part of Nuseirat Camp, where I am displaced, to leave, I don’t feel the same. I could have been killed before, at any minute, by any of these bombardments, yet now I feel it coming towards me and my family.

There are only three of my friends from Gaza City displaced to Bureij and Nuseirat. Th three of them are in the areas ordered to evacuate and leave. Yesterday I tried to reach them by mobile. Did not work. I walked to one of them. He was not there. It was too late to walk to the others – one in Bureij and the other in Nuseirat near Bureij, the Salahaldeen Road separating them. Bureij, east of Salahaldeen, borders Israel, and Nuseirat is west of it.

Today I went to Al Awda Hospital. The first message was from my friend and colleague, Mohammed:

Dear Hossam, 

I am preparing to leave with my family for Rafah. I am now busy searching for materials to build a tent there in Rafah. I don’t know when we will communicate or meet again. I hope soon.

Stay safe until then,

Mohammed.

I don’t know why after reading this message, the feeling of fear came up to the surface and overrode my ability to tolerate it. 

I could not stay. I thought about going to Bureij to check on my friend Eyad. Bombing and heavy targeting started last night. I rejected the idea, I felt like a coward.

Then I thought about Maher. He is in Nuseirat. I will go. I walked 2km, arrived to find there are no cars in front of his home. It’s a building of 3 floors. Up to yesterday it was hosting more than 80 people. Maher’s brother, the home owner, was there, taking things from the house and loading them into a mini-bus. Mattresses, blankets, bead flour, suitcases, bags…

• What’s up? I said
• We’re leaving.
• Where’s Maher?
• He left yesterday with his family, they all left, myself and my wife are the last.
• Where to?
• Rafah. We’ve a brother living there, Maher and his family went there Myself and my wife will go to my daughter’s home in Zawayda.

There was nothing to be said. The man was busy and rushing to load his stuff.

I said: ‘Goodbye, be safe.’

Walking back to Al Awda Hospital, holding my mobile the whole way and trying to call Eyad. I tried more than 50 times and all the calls failed.

Suddenly I stopped. I feel something is wrong. I feel dizzy, unable to walk properly. The fear invades me from the top of my head to the bottom of my feet. I don’t feel well. I continue walking. Arrived at the hospital, went to the office. I started to collect my stuff; the laptop, the mobile charger, the small battery that I use to light some led lights. I finished and got ready to leave. Then I sat down again. I don’t want to go home with these feelings, in this condition. I must control myself.

Arriving home, talking to Abeer about what we shall do.

She has a sister in Rafah, a widow with 5 girls living not far from Alnajjar Hospital, living in a very small house of two rooms with a small living room. Shall we go there? Shall we send some of us so if something happens here we can move more easily and lighter? We are around 22 people. Maybe her mother and sister and her sister’s family can go tomorrow and then we can figure out what to do next.

We do not decide yet. We are still discussing the options when her brother, his wife and 3 children arrive with their luggage. They were in Nuseirat, not far form the area ordered to evacuate. So he is seeking refuge at his father’s home. Fair enough.

What next? We finished our talk without deciding anything. No safe place in Gaza Strip. People moving from place to place seeking non-existent safety. I am one of them. There is a storm outside, the wind is screaming, heavy rain and the cold is reaching my bones while the bombing is continuing and this time not far at all.

I am afraid. I feel so lonely.