With every sunrise, after a harrowing night echoing unabatedly with explosions, we renew our unyielding grip on life. We try to create an optimistic beginning to a day that feels as long as a year. A day we hope will be free of massacres, loss, and cries for help.
We dream of securing food, filling water tanks, and most of all, avoiding sudden ‘evacuation’ orders from the Israeli Occupation Forces. However, reality starkly contrasts with our dreams.
Since the early morning, my brother Montaser ventured out, searching for daily essentials in markets drained of goods, their shelves left bare. My father, holding himself together, worked tirelessly — filling water tanks alongside his grandchildren, who waited eagerly for a fleeting moment to play. Later, he went to console neighbors mourning loved ones. My mother cleaned flour infested with worms, a grim luxury in our unforgiving reality. Despite knowing the flour was contaminated, we convinced ourselves it wouldn't cause a health crisis. Psychological tricks, they say — but what other choice did we have?
We are facing a genocide and a humanitarian crisis. With food supplies dwindling, the elderly are suffering from malnutrition, and babies are starving due to the inaccessibility of formula milk. Patients with celiac disease, deprived of gluten-free diets, face dire consequences. Amid this grim backdrop, my brother Mahmoud prepared to bake bread — a task he had taken on during the war. But we had run out of firewood, forcing him to join endless queues at bakeries that now rely on firewood instead of gas.
Meanwhile, I was studying for an online cardiovascular system exam when a treacherous airstrike hit nearby. Everything around me shook violently, and the suffocating stench of gunpowder filled the air. I could barely call out, "Is everyone okay?" The cries of people drowned out the sound of the blasts.
The strike bore a massacre. A bustling area in our neighborhood — where people sought necessities or exchanged fleeting smiles — was reduced to rubble. A group of youths, exhausted from more than 420 days of relentless struggle, had gathered to find solace in each other's company. The airstrike ended their lives in an instant, ripping through their bodies and scattering their remains.
Thirty martyrs. Dozens injured. Among them were two women, returning home with loaves of bread for their children. Those loaves, soaked in their blood and padded with their flesh, told a story too cruel to bear. How can a child process such a tragic link between bread and death?
A little girl in a pink dress with long hair was found among the rubble. She was recognized only by her dress, torn and bloodied. I choose to remember her as she was in photographs — an angel, not the broken body we retrieved.
My brothers and neighbors rushed to help, but they could do little beyond collecting scattered remains from the street. Stray cats and dogs gnawed at the flesh of those who once cared for them.
Montaser, who had been at the market minutes before the strike, returned home horrified, his soul scarred forever. Though he survived physically, the memories will haunt him for life.
The shrapnel didn’t just pierce bodies — it tore through displaced families' tents, causing fatal injuries, and punctured water tanks my father had spent his morning filling. In an instant, what little water we had was gone.
By evening, as my nephew Ahmed and I stood in the kitchen, the shattered window and missile-pierced walls framed a red glow that blinded us. The menacing sound of a drone buzzed in the background. I thought it was another strike and crouched, shielding Ahmed as best as I could. But it was only the radiant sunset. Even in moments of beauty, war haunted us.
Later, I juggled my studies, trying to focus. Around 4 p.m., a strange sense of joy seeped into the air — ululations and clapping echoed in the neighborhood. Someone was getting married. My feelings were mixed: I admired my people’s resilience and hope, yet I could not reconcile it with the morning massacre.
By midnight, rain poured heavily. All I could think about was the displaced families in makeshift tents. Their shelters sank into the sand, their belongings strewed by the gusting wind. One neighbor cried, “God, I beg you, stop the rain. We are drowning.”
We invited them into our home, but they refused. “Death is more honorable than this life,” one replied.
It is heartbreaking to be warm while others shiver. To have food while others starve. To survive while others perish. Even though we face the same horrors collectively, I cannot escape the guilt of surviving when others did not.
This is the dichotomy of our lives in Gaza;
We cling to life, but we are killed.
We mourn our dead, but we carry their legacy.
We run, but we are amputated.
We fly, but we are besieged.
Our hearts are shattered by grief, yet we find reasons to celebrate.
We deserve to live fully, love deeply, and be free entirely. But we are suffering.
How can desperation and hope coexist?
That is the story of every day — not just today.
