One of my goals this year was to join the organizing team of the Hult Prize Award among university students around the world, So I waited impatiently for the application forms, and I filled them out. Fortunately, I got accepted in the first stage of this competition and entered the interview stage. Interviews for the organizing team of the Hult Prize were on Oct. 7 in Ayan Hotel on the Gaza beach.
That day, I woke up early, put on a formal outfit, and prepared myself for the interview questions. The fate of my future for this year was about to be determined in a fifteen-minute interview. However, this future soon faced a harsh reality that ended it. A suffocating blockade that lasted for 17 years burst into rampant explosions and conflict, ending many dreams and goals.
War started and the bombardments were around us. But it was not the worst part as we were surprised on the second day by leaflets dropping over our area, Al-Nasr neighborhood, demanding us to evacuate the place and migrate to other locations the Occupation claimed to be safe. Thus, I evacuated for the first time with my family under heavy bombardment and went to my uncle’s house in Al-Saftawi district. We stayed with them for no more than a week until the afternoon of the sixth day, when we were surprised by a call from Israeli forces telling us to evacuate the area because they were going to bomb us! Perhaps the emotions of that moment were not as sorrowful as the ones in the first time we evacuated, however, it was sorrowful still.
So we evacuated for the second time, heading to my middle sister’s house in Al-Yazji district. We stayed there for less than four days, and then disaster began with famine, electricity blackouts, and water cutouts. Electricity was available for no more than an hour and a half a day, and we were hunting it down to charge our phones and browse the latest news. All of that while enduring the weight of heavy bombing.
Shortly after midnight on the fourth night of the second evacuation, we were distressed by loud noise from the street and the yelling of citizens. They were asking inhabitants of the district to evacuate because officers from the Israeli Occupation Forces called them demanding that people evacuate to yet another area that they claimed to be safe. The sight was harsh; mothers yelling and running with their children in the street, and fathers sending their children with their mothers to other districts while they go back to try and collect their things from their houses before catching up with their families — but where to?
My family and I could not find any shelter or house to go to, so we were forced to go to Al-Nasr Childrens’ Hospital. That is because, according to international law, it is forbidden to bomb hospitals and their surrounding areas. These incidents were on day 13 of the war, and that was our third evacuation in less than two weeks. It is crucial here to highlight that the word “evacuation” is not a light word nor is it an easy one, because it means you will be forced, every time, to pack your belongings and move toward an unknown fate. In our case, that was Al-Nasr Childrens’ Hospital where we suffered from electricity outages and water scarcity.
I stayed in the hospital with my family and my uncles’ families who also were forced to evacuate their neighborhoods due to the threats they received. Food was scarce and the bombing was intense, not to mention the severe overcrowding in the hospital as many houses beside it were bombed. There was a residential building crowded with displaced people opposite to the hospital and a mosque beside the hospital. Although it was a source of peace and reassurance for us, the mosque was also a source of concern as places of worship were a primary bombing target for the Israeli occupation, and going to pray in them was a risk.
Hence, during my stay at the hospital, I tried reading books to escape from this reality. And between reading a word and hearing a blast, I was able to finish Agatha Christie's novel “And Then There Were None”.
I remember I once sat with my sister on the hospital stairs reminiscing over our days before the war. I was overtaken by nostalgia, so I took out my journal and started writing a diary of the war’s 25th day of the war which fell on Oct. 31, 2023 at 8:10 p.m. I remember writing that night, sitting with some friends under a tree, when we heard the echo of a nearby bombing and some shrapnel fell on us, causing us minor injuries.
Days passed and the bombing around us intensified, and one day we were surprised by a sound inside the hospital saying: “There’s a sniper unit near the hospital that targets anyone who walks out the door.” The situation escalated to include sniping anyone moving in the hospital’s courtyard. Once, we were all forced to enter the inner sections of the hospital due to the intense bombing; we slept in the corridors that night. We were startled the next morning to find that a room overlooking the courtyard was bombed. Two girls were martyred and one lost her arm. Although the bombing was inside the hospital, we couldn’t decipher which of the noises were from the targeting of the hospital. I remember that was on day 30 of the war.
The sounds of clashes and blasts persisted around the hospital, and no one was able to enter or leave. I remember that I one day woke up to the news of the martyrdom of three people at the hospital’s gate!
Day 35 of the war was a turning point, as my cousin came in the morning to tell me: “The tanks are at the hospital’s gate.” I did not believe the news at first, until there was a bombing inside the building. I remember lying under the door and not being able to stand up. The doctors closed all the curtains and switched off all the lights. No one dared to move or make any sound. In a moment, the whole place had the feel of a ghost town. Then we heard another intense bombing sound, and realized that the tank at the gate had hit the upper floor.
After that, we all gathered in the hospital courtyard and prepared ourselves to leave. As we stood there, the Occupation’s provocations began. They threw smoke grenades around us. I looked for my family, met them, and made sure that our important belongings, such as our house papers and documents, were with us. We left and moved toward the Al-Ayoun intersection. I began to see tanks from afar and hear their engines roaring. While I was busy examining the details of those tanks and the soldiers atop the buildings around the hospital, my foot stumbled over something, and here was the tragedy. I saw two bodies: a young man and his mother who were killed by a sniper’s bullet. The white flag lay next to them, smeared with their blood.
We continued our journey and turned right toward Al-Jalaa Street, where I was separated from my family. At this moment, I ran into the martyr Dr. Refaat Al-Areer, with whom I studied poetic rhythm at college. I remember him asking me: “Do you need any help? I am ready for anything.” I stammered and said: “No, Professor, thank you,” then corrected myself saying: “I mean, doctor!” He went on his way, and I did not know that it would be our last meeting. I went back and met my mother and sister first, then my brother and father. We all gathered and moved to reach Al-Jalaa Street, and this was the most difficult decision for us, causing a lot of hesitation. Do we head south or remain in the north at the mercy of the destructive murder machine? I remember that it was approximately 12 noon, and after much hesitation as the time got later, we all agreed to head south. That was the beginning of a new chapter of suffering and war.
Later, we continued our way on foot towards the Tayaran intersection in the middle area of Gaza, together with large crowds of people and lots of fatigue. But we had to arrive, so we carried what we could and continued our journey. When we arrived at the intersection, I noticed a taxi, ran to it, and stopped it. We headed from the Tayaran intersection to the Kuwaiti roundabout. When we arrived, we had to ride in horse-drawn carts to reach a place near the checkpoint between the north and the south. It took us approximately an hour to get there.
At a certain point, the cart owner would stop and not proceed forward, and from there we continued our journey on foot towards the checkpoint, joining the crowds of people along the path. I saw sights that I will never forget for the rest of my life!
At the beginning, I saw traces of people who were here before me and had to leave their luggage and documents on the ground as they could not carry them. The cart owner warned us: “If your mother were to fall beside you, do not turn your head and just keep moving forward!” What kind of arrogance, destruction and injustice can a human suffer in a world that claims to be in the 21st century?!
I carried on my way and began to see the soldiers hidden behind sand hills, along with their tanks, vehicles, and bulldozers. We were previously asked to hold our ID cards high, but my sister who was a doctor had lost her ID, and had to identify herself with her medical card. Suddenly, the Occupation officer shouted at us to stop, and asked the holder of the blue card to come forward and move towards him. My sister was the holder of that card, so she refused to come forward, threw away her card and stood still. The soldier shouted again telling us to continue walking, so we continued and crossed that checkpoint on Salah al-Din Street. And here, another long walk began.
While I was walking, I noticed an old woman who had fainted due to fatigue, and I remember that a doctor rushed to help and treat her. Upon our arrival at the Wadi Gaza Bridge, we heard the sounds of explosions, and some shells were falling around us in a provocative attempt against us. But they went beyond that and started deliberately targeting the evacuees, on Salah al-Din Street, which they claimed was safe. Two martyrs from the group we had joined fell in front of my eyes. That was day 35 of the war, approximately 3:30 in the afternoon.
We continued our journey on a horse-drawn cart towards the Deir al-Balah junction, then we rode a bus with another displaced family to make our way towards the town of Bani Suhaila, east of Khan Yunis, in the south of the strip. Upon our arrival on the outskirts of Khan Yunis, its citizens began welcoming us, offering us water, food, and juice. They were all saying: “If you don’t have a shelter, our homes are open for you.”
Here, the feelings of deep sadness from leaving Gaza City mixed with some happiness because, despite all this destruction, our people are still united at heart, sharing their food and little provisions, and perhaps what remains of their happiness, with other afflicted people “even if they themselves are needy” (Verse 9 of Surah Al-Hashr).
As we heard the Maghrib call to prayer, we arrived at the house that was our destination. It was the house of my sister’s friend’s relatives. We entered the room, and the people of the house prepared for us all the amenities available at a time of war. They also prepared us lunch, places to sleep and everything.We all threw the bags on the floor and sat on the bed, and without exception, we all wept in this moment, and I proclaim that this day was one of the most difficult days that any human being could suffer through in their life.
My sister's friend came and consoled her and my mother, and I consoled my father, and in an attempt to uplift everyone’s mood, I insisted that we start eating, so we ate. We do not know what happened afterwards; the time was close to 7 p.m., but suddenly it became 1 p.m. It was the first time we slept without terror or fear from the sound of continuous bombing. That day was Nov. 10 of last year, and it was our fourth displacement.
We tried to restore normal life and heal ourselves from the psychological damage of the past month. The days passed normally, with some bombing and explosion sounds, but the suffering was caused by electricity, water, and cooking gas outages. We were forced to light wood on fire to cook food on — in addition to the scarcity of essential resources — but it was necessary to adapt and survive. The days passed quickly in Bani Suhaila. I met some old friends, and we would sit and try to remember our normal days, university life and other things. We would laugh, and that would lighten our burdens, even if just a little. Some nights passed without us being able to sleep, given that the town of Bani Suhaila is close to the eastern border, and the sounds of clashes were clearly audible, but what were we to do?
After 20 days of staying in the city of Khan Yunis, I was surprised one day by the owner of the house knocking on our room door forcefully in the morning and yelling: “Evacuation! Evacuation! The army officers called us, and the entire eastern area of Khan Yunis must be evacuated.” Are you kidding me? These are the same officers who told us to go south and said it would be a safe place? How can they ask us to evacuate the place as urgently and quickly as we did in Al-Nasr Hospital? The artillery shelling intensified around us, so we were forced to evacuate Bani Suhaila and head towards the central region, to the town of Deir al-Balah.
Here, we separated from my sister. She went with her husband to his relatives’ house, and I went with my parents and brother toward the UNRWA shelter centers, where two of my uncles and my father’s aunt, who is nearly 80 years old, were sheltering. This was the fifth displacement, on the 55th day of the war.
We stayed for a few days at the shelter center, which was a middle school, and here was the peak of our suffering from the lack of hygiene and food. I’ll leave it up to you to imagine what it would be like to be forced to stand for an hour waiting your turn in front of the bathrooms. The center we sheltered in was located on Salah al-Din Street, which was classified more than once as a red zone. One day, the bombing and clashes intensified around us, and suddenly, we heard the sound of an explosion inside the school. Fumes rose from one of the rooms, so we quickly left the school amidst heavy bombing, and headed toward the town of Al-Zawaida, near Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, to a land where two of my uncles were staying, and here we reach our sixth displacement in 60 days of war!
