AT THE DOORS OF THE UNRWA OFFICES – A QUEUE TO REGISTER TO RECEIVE FLOUR

Queues of hundreds of people to register and obtain a number and appointment to receive flour.  It’s an ongoing daily queue.

Queues at the doors of the supermarket and commercial shops…stampedes and traffic jams.  The queues continued to form at the entrances of the shops until the goods ran out.  Then these queues disappeared.

Queues at the Bank

A daily queue at the ATM to withdraw cash.  Short queues of a few dozen people.  Most people don’t even have cash in the banks.  Only those who are employed and some rich people….Several thousand out of millions of people in the Gaza Strip stand in front of the ATMs. These are daily queues.

Current Queues:

Current queues started with the truce, queues for cooking gas, for solar power and for petrol, delivered in limited amounts to several gas stations.

Hundreds of cars and carts arrive and line up in a queue stretching for a more than a kilometre, hoping to get fuel whose price has leapt up on the black market.

War is ruin, war is destruction, war is death.  War steals from human beings the most important thing that distinguishes them.  War steals their humanity.  This is something that Israel knows.  This is what Israel is doing in Gaza.

QUEUE

QUEUE

During the fifty days, there were many queues.

Queues started, then disappeared.  There were queues, and there still are.  New queues started when the truce began.

A queue for bread, the first queue. Thousands of people standing in a queue in front of the bakery to get the permitted amount of bread, barely enough for one day for a family of 5 people. An orderly queue.

But from time to time, there is a selfish person who pushes himself in front of others, so problems arise.  It ends up with him being shoved far away until he takes his proper place in the queue.

These queues disappeared bit by bit.  In Nuseirat, for example, there were four bread bakeries. The Israelis bombed two of them.  So there were bigger queues at the remaining bakeries until there was no more flour in the market and the gas, upon which the baking and dough-making machines depended, was all used up.

What happened in Nuseirat happened in all the cities of the Gaza Strip.

Half the bakeries in the Gaza Strip were bombed and collapsed on the heads of those working all night long, preparing the bread to answer the needs of the people.  And some closed their doors when there was no more flour left in the market.

And so, in a scheduled way, the people were driven towards famine.

My mother once again

With the tear in her stomach, vomiting happening from time to time, eating nothing for 2-3 days and bleeding in her gastro-intestinal system, the hospital is a must, just to stop the bleeding. Nexium 40mm twice a day in her veins. I bought everything as we did last time, when we asked a neighbour who is a nurse to do the procedure.

The neighbour nurse is not there. She lives in the house next to my father-in-law’s house that was warned it would be bombed. They evacuated.

What can I do? Went out in the street. I don’t know the people; it is not my neighbourhood, I am a stranger here.

I asked people on the street if they know of a nurse nearby. Amazing, at the third house a man said:

  – My wife is a nurse.

I explained to him what we needed. He entered his house and within 5 minutes came out with his wife. We went to our home. She did what needed to be done but my mother’s veins are closed up, they do not absorb the medicine. The nurse said sharply: 

  – She must be taken to hospital!

I’ve kept some fuel, enough for 50km, inside my car for an emergency. Enough to drive us to Rafah. 

This is an emergency. I took my mother to a community hospital in Nuseirat Camp. While driving there the bombing did not stop, as usual, at every minute.

Arrived at the hospital. Outside they have installed a big tent like a field hospital. Some beds inside with some injured people and doctors treating them. Many people moving on all sides, an ambulance arrives, people automatically clear a space for the ambulance. 3 Bodies covered with blankets. Another ambulance arrives, 4 injured; a woman, a young man and 2 children. The young man lost a leg, lots of blood. I did not know what to do. My mother can’t be a priority in this situation. While standing by the entrance, a gentle nurse approached me asking if he could help. I explained my mother’s situation. He said: 

   – Normally we must make a haemoglobin blood test, heart and blood pressure tests, but you see how messy the situation is. I’ll get the Nexium and syringe, inject it with 40mm saline. Come inside.

I went into the first corridor; many people, blood on the floor, a lady is busy cleaning, a bucket of clear water, in 2 minutes it became red, she took it, disappeared for 5 minutes and came back with the bucket refilled with clear water. Some people crying in sorrow, nurses and doctors moving at speed all over the place. The nurse left me, I had been there for 20 minutes when he came back with the cannula, dressing, syringe and the Nexium. He was very good. In 2 minutes he did all that was needed.

My mother slept in her wheelchair. I took her out, lifted her into the car and drove back home.

Night fell. Usually I am a man who likes evenings and night-time, it is my relaxing time, I play cards with my friends, watch favourite movies, lie down lazily on my couch. Now I am unable to like evenings or nights. As darkness falls, life stops, frozen, no movement, no activities, no sounds but the sound of bombing and drones which double in the silence a million times.

My mother woke up with her hallucinations again, her internal fear that I can’t help. She sees people and things, people that provoke her and things that frighten her. She screams out of fear, she sees me doing bad things and she curses me, and I am helpless. The calming pills do not help this time. From 5pm until the following morning at 8.20am she suffers from her hallucinations and I suffer from insomnia and helplessness. I went downstairs to get her breakfast. 10 minutes later, I came up and she was asleep. I did not wake her, she needs to sleep. She needs to rest.

I called Dr Yasser Abu Jamei. He is a psychiatrist and the General Manager of Gaza Mental Health Program. Explained to him my mother’s case, he sent a message with the name of a medicine that I should give her, one pill every evening. I left my mother asleep, or maybe unconscious and went to the UNRWA clinic. No internet, could do nothing, just wrote part of this piece, bought the medicine and went back home. Back at home my mum was still asleep. It is 6.13pm. She is still asleep. The breakfast is still there, untouched. Is this good? Is this bad? Shall I wake her up and give her the medicine? But I am afraid that she’ll wake up with her hallucinations and spend another night of fear and insomnia. Is it ok to let her sleep this much? I don’t know. I will wait. I took some food, my first meal of the day. I washed my body with some water, a shower is an unavailable luxury. It is 8.15pm. She slept 12 hours. 11.25pm, 15 hours! Finally I decided (selfishly) to leave her asleep and see what would happen.

By the way, now I only have fuel in my car for 40km. 

The valley of death.

An introduction may be needed!

Israeli army obviously determined to empty all the hospitals of Gaza City and the north no matter the cost. 

No matter how many lives lost, 

No matter how many injured people and regular patients won’t receive treatment, 

No matter how many tumour and cancer patients die, 

No matter how many patients in the Intensive Care Units will die, 

No matter how many patients will choke without oxygen, 

No matter how many people in need of urgent surgery will not get it, 

No matter how many premature babies, not completely born yet, won’t see life, as they will suffocate in their incubators – two died already according to the Ministry of Health,

No matter what International Humanitarian Law and the 4th Geneva Convention say,

Israeli army cut the electricity completely from day one of the war, then prevented the entry of any fuel that could operate the electricity of stand-by generators and also bombed all solar panels on the roofs of the hospitals: 

Al Shifa in Gaza City, 

The Indonesian Hospital in the north, 

Kamal Adwan in Beit Lahia,

Al Rantisi, the only children’s cancer hospital in all of the Gaza Strip – three died already, according to the Ministry of Health, 

Al Nasr Hospital in Gaza City, the specialised paediatric hospital. 

The Psychiatric Hospital, the only psychiatric hospital in the Gaza Strip. 

All these hospitals were obliged to stop operating, some were bombed, others damaged.

Al Shifa hospital is the main hospital in Gaza Strip and the biggest. It was a target for the Israeli army from the beginning. They bombed the baby delivery section, they bombed the outdoor clinics, they bombed the main gate several times and, each time, people were killed and injured. They bombed ambulances carrying injured people at the hospital gate. Yesterday they got very close to the hospital, bombing and shooting around it as if a gate of hell opened, bombing and destroying most of the houses and buildings surrounding the hospital.

My eldest brother, 60 years old, with his 2 sons, Mohammed, 23 years and Hisham,15 years old and his sick, blind wife took refuge at Al Shifa Hospital on 12th October 2023. My brother’s wife suffers from kidney failure. She needs hospital treatment 3 times a week; she needs to be connected to a machine through her veins in order to clean her blood. Each time the machine functions as a kidney for 4 hours. As a matter of fact, that’s why they chose to take refuge at Al Shifa Hospital. Many of the 50,000 displaced people inside Al Shifa Hospital are families of sick people with chronic diseases. They’re there so they can get health services more easily. Many of them are families of people injured during the war.

Yesterday, my brother and his family decided to leave. They were certain of being killed if they stayed. They go south, out of Gaza City. My brother, carrying 60 years of agony, poverty, hard work and pain on his shoulders, his son Mohammed pulling the wheelchair with his mother on it, the mother holding a bag of stuff, clothes and some food, on her lap, and Hisham, the young boy, carrying a backpack and a handbag. With the bombing, the shooting, the drone noise, the airforce passing, the sound of the crowd surrounding them, they walk out.

They need to go to the Zeitoun area, a distance of 3 kilometres, in order to reach Salah Al-Deen Road which connects Gaza from north to south. They walk. Streets are empty except for some people also carrying what they can of their belongings, heading toward Salah Al-Deen Road. 

Streets? Destroyed, damaged, big holes, water leakage, sewage leakage.

For 200 meters, for my brother and his family, it was absolutely similar to walking through a mine-field, walking side by side with death. They’d already seen dead bodies along the road.

Passing tanks, soldiers, they continue another 2 km before arriving at an area where there are people, just 1km from Bureij and Nuseirat Camps. They finally found a donkey cart to give them a ride to Al Aqsa Hospital in Deir Al Balah, 18km from Gaza City.

This was no different from Dante’s Inferno in The Divine Comedy, maybe Dante would be even more inspired if he walked this route.

Mohammed, most of the time and whenever possible, was trying to call me. Mobiles did not work. At 9pm my mobile was ringing, it was Mohammed,

   – ‘Where are you? Are you safe? Could never reach you while you were in Gaza’.

   – ‘We are in Al Aqsa Hospital, with nothing’.

   – ‘Try to manage tonight, I will be there in the morning’.

There is nothing to be done at this time; no movement at dark.

First thing in the morning, I went to Deir Al Balah. It was early. Walked. Walking total today is 11.5 km.

I arrived, people everywhere. The front and back yards of the hospital are full of displaced people, injured people and their families. At the gate of the hospital, they were laying out 3 dead bodies, just arrived from Nuseirat, from a bombing of a house there.

I start to ask people about the new arrivals from Gaza City. There were many. I kept asking and looking until I found them, in a small space of 2 metres square, provided by a family who’d been taking 4 metres square.

Mohammed was not there, he’d gone to get some medicine for his mother. My brother has aged 50 years in these few days and since I last saw him 40 days ago. Hisham was sitting beside his mother, doing nothing, saying nothing, his eye balls do not move, looking to one side, looking at nothing. I tried to talk to him. He did not respond. Hisham, the boy who I love the most, the boy who loves me the most. Hisham, who every time I visit, runs towards me and asks for a hug. Hisham is not responding to me. What happened my boy?

I don’t know if it is the psychological first aid techniques that I learned during my work as a Child Protection Officer, or the power of love, after 15 minutes Hisham looked at me, jumped into my arms and cried, cried as he never did, cried and cried, his body moved and shook in my arms. I did not cry. I hold back my tears, my tears that wanted very much to come out. I hold back so it burns me inside. Cry, baby, cry my son, no shame, cry as much as you want, cry as much as you were afraid, cry until your cries reach the sky or reach a moving heart somewhere in this mad world.

Messages from Gaza Now

Tuesday, 24th October 2023 | 19:00 – 21:00

P21 GALLERY
21-23 Chalton Street London NW1 1JD

https://p21.gallery/news/141

This event will be a sharing of texts and messages we have received over the past few days from our colleagues and friends in Gaza.

Az Theatre (London) and Theatre for Everybody (Gaza) have been in creative partnership since 2009.  Az has been in constant contact with our colleagues and friends in Gaza and they have sent us voice messages and texts which describe their experiences of the bombing, the evacuation of the north of Gaza, the conditions in which they find themselves away from their homes and their efforts to get provisions for their families and to help their neighbours and other displaced communities.

This event is a chance to breathe into the personal experiences of Palestinians in the crisis caused by genocidal violence.  Listening and bearing witness together we can deepen our sense of solidarity and love.

The readings will be read by the group of artists who have assembled themselves around the GAZA: THERE & HERE project that Az Theatre have been developing in London with Theatre for Everybody in Gaza, including an event in December at P21 and a ‘Listening Circle Event’ in Finsbury Park in September of this year.

Az was in the process of developing a new stage of its collaboration called AUGUST 9th PROJECT (the date in 2018 when the Israeli armed forces destroyed the Al Mishal Cultural Centre in Gaza).  It involves 30 creative workshop sessions in 3 centres in Gaza.  The people who have sent these messages and accounts are the Co-Directors of Theatre for Everybody, Hossam Madhoun and Jamal Al Rozzi alongside producer/manager Shouq Al Najjar.

HOSTED BY Az Theatre

Book via the link below:

 BOOK NOW 

GAZA: THERE & HERE

LISTENING CIRCLE EVENT                                                    

Sunday 10th September 2023 

3pm – 4.30pm

Finsbury Park, London

 entering the park by Manor House Entrance, turn right onto main pathway, a short way along opposite the polytunnels under the trees

Live from Gaza! Conversation with Theatre for Everybody and friends PLUS Public reading of accounts of military invasion from testimonies by Palestinian citizens of Gaza.

Listening to experiences and voices of Palestinians in Gaza, amongst the trees in a city park in London on a late Summer Sunday afternoon, can we hear and can we share? 

Join us and bring something to sit on! An umbrella if it’s raining!

This is a continuation of the work created by Jonathan Chadwick and Ruth Lass based on Frank Smith’s GAZA D’ICI-LA.  

In this work Frank Smith has created ‘accounts’ extracted from the reports of testimonies given by Gaza citizens to the Goldstone Inquiry (United Nation’s Fact-finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict) in 2009.  This is the sole time that citizens of Gaza have given evidence to an international judicial body about their experiences of military attack and treatment by Israeli armed forces.

We may include the reading of other texts about the experiences of people in Gaza at this upcoming LISTENING CIRCLE EVENT

We ran an event at P21 Gallery in June 2023 where we asked artists to read these accounts following a live conversation with Hossam Madhoun and Jamal Al Rozzi, Directors of Theatre for Everybody in Gaza.  We also read and exchanged with our friends in Gaza the accounts that Hossam Madhoun wrote during the 2014 attack on Gaza.  These account are available here.

We are experimenting with an open public accessible ways of presenting this material.  We want to find ways of deepening solidarity with Palestinians and increasing our understanding of their experience.

Thank you to all the people who took part in our event in June.