On the afternoon of 5 October, Israeli air strikes began to target the al-Faluja area of Jabaliya in northern Gaza where I lived.

At first, we thought they were the “normal” raids and that they would subside. But, as night fell, the bombardment intensified greatly, dashing our expectations. The sky was filled with warplanes and drones.

At midnight, there was a knock on the door of our house. It was my cousin Karam and his family, who had had to leave their home because it had been struck on the roof by a missile. They escaped what they presumed to be certain death to take refuge with us.

It was a difficult night. We had to stay away from any windows, because there was shrapnel and bullets flying everywhere. We all stayed in one room, stuck together and prayed for safety.

The next day, we saw a large number of people evacuating toward Gaza City. We made a joint decision to stay – although Karam’s family decided to go stay with relatives in Gaza City. For the rest of us, including Karam, it seemed too soon into Israel’s reinvasion of the north to leave our home. We still had hope that this would be temporary, a dark cloud that would dissipate.

But the day after, on 7 October, the Israeli military erected barriers at the Abu Sharakh roundabout, just 100 meters from our home, to prevent people from leaving the area. Some residents tried anyway.

I ventured out, briefly, out of curiosity, saw the large barricades blocking the roads and heard multiple gunshots from quadcopters. From a distance I could see several bodies left lying in the street as no one could reach them, not even ambulances.

Crowded and trapped

In our house, we were 25, including my family and our displaced relatives. None of us dared even step outside at this point.

In order to eat, we lit a fire inside to bake bread and prepare meals. Every missile strike, every shelling caused the children to scream. Tension and anxiety filled the house. Long discussions ensued about whether we should leave. But where could we go? The road west, to Gaza City, was completely blocked, and the route east was perilous.

All of Jabaliya had become a battlefield.

Throughout the night of 9 October, Apache helicopters and quadcopters rained down bullets on rooftops. This caused what looked like most water tanks atop houses to be destroyed – tanks residents had worked and walked long to fill.

All night long, we heard the sound of gunfire mixed with water trickling down, flooding streets and homes. We knew that by morning, we would have no water. But there was nothing we could do.

No one slept. We sat, trembling, bracing ourselves for the next missile.

At dawn, the debate about leaving the area reignited. Some argued that fleeing was our best chance, while others believed it would only expose us to danger and serve the goal of forcibly displacing us from our homes.

But by five in the afternoon, we learned that most homes in our area had been targeted the previous night. We had not heard this earlier because most people had been too frightened to leave their homes to tell others, and there was no mobile signal.

So when we saw most of our neighbors on the move, we finally made the difficult decision to leave.

Departure

With heavy hearts, we parted ways with my aunts and other relatives who had taken refuge with us. We divided up into smaller units to find refuge with relatives. There was no longer any place big enough to hold all of us. Tears filled our eyes as we separated, having faced a year or more of displacement together, aside from my cousin, the latest arrival.

We – that is my parents, my two younger sisters, Sama and Hala, my brother, Osama, and Karam – made our way toward the Tel al-Zaatar area, while our relatives headed toward Beit Lahiya. We stayed at my great uncle’s house for nine nights, enduring constant bombings. The intensity of the strikes made the ground tremble beneath us.

It was terrifying.

My cousin had hoped to reunite with his family in Gaza City, but time worked against him. Checkpoints had sprung up overnight and the road was closed, so he stayed with us.

With us too was our beloved cat, Falfoul, who had moved with us from the very first days of the war and accompanied us through every stage of our journey. Falfoul held a special place in my father’s heart, perhaps even more than the rest of us.

The morning of 18 October unfolded as normally as any during genocide. We woke up, baked bread, prepared breakfast and performed Friday prayers together.

After lunch, we all went about our routines: Sama and I headed to the kitchen to wash dishes. Falfoul stuck by my side. I stroked his head and neck, and he nuzzled me as if it were a farewell. Hala went to wash. Osama and Karam lay down to rest, and my parents went to the living room.

At 2 pm everything suddenly went black. I couldn’t see, hear or speak. Around me was just dense blackness. Sand and dust blurred my vision. I could barely see. I had a terrifying thought that I was the only survivor because I couldn’t hear anyone else.

Devastation

Gradually, sounds returned. I felt rubble beneath my feet. I stumbled forward until I heard my mother’s voice. Osama recited the shahada: “I bear witness that there is no god but God, and Muhammad is his prophet.”

We all repeated after him, feeling that death was at our door.

Slowly, the darkness lifted, and we began to see the devastation around us. In the living room, we found my father unconscious. We screamed. My mother checked him, fearing the worst, but suddenly he opened his eyes and assured us that he was fine.

But he was injured. His right leg was torn, bleeding profusely, with bone showing. We shouted for help, and our neighbors rushed over to carry him on a rug from the living room to the door, to wait for an ambulance.

Osama and Karam carried him outside, both barefoot, stepping on rubble, broken furniture, glass and shrapnel. My mother followed, shocked and bareheaded. My sisters and I were left behind, wondering what to do.

We knew we had to leave, so we packed what was left of our belongings and kept looking for Falfoul. From the moment of the bombing, I had searched for Falfoul. We couldn’t find him. Carrying our bags, we left the destroyed house in tears, worrying for our wounded father and mourning his missing cat.

Falfoul, his loyal companion, would wait for my father by the door, even when he was late, and only ever wanted to sleep by his side. Falfoul would even jump on my father when he came home with his favorite treats and refused to let anyone else bathe him.

When we stepped into the street, the area looked like a ghost town. Large parts had been reduced to rubble. There was debris everywhere. We realized we were among the luckier ones. Most houses in the area looked like they had been hit directly. Ours had not been targeted but caught in the general destruction that had leveled the residential block around us.

Our injuries were also minor compared to the tragedy around us. We had some small cuts on our arms and feet. We walked aimlessly through the streets, unsure where to go. Passersby stopped, staring at us.

“What happened,” they would ask. “Where are you coming from? Is it true you emerged from death?”

Displaced again

We eventually arrived at my aunt’s home in the Beit Lahiya area, to which she and her family had also been displaced.

When they saw us, their faces betrayed shock. We all began crying, too overwhelmed to explain. I went to the bathroom to wash my face, noticing it was covered in ash, dust and traces of blood from minor scratches.

Splashing water on my face, I hoped I’d wake up from this nightmare. But I had to hold myself together for my sisters, as I was now the eldest in the absence of our parents.

Two hours after the attack, we returned to look for Falfoul. My father had been muttering his name in his bed in al-Awda hospital. We searched everywhere, flipping over anything we hadn’t seen before. We consoled ourselves that Falfoul had to be alive since we hadn’t found his body. He was probably hiding, terrified by the chaos.

That evening, my mother joined us, explaining that the hospital hadn’t allowed her to stay with my father overnight. They told her to come back early in the morning, even though he had wanted her to stay. Helpless, she had to leave him.

But luck was again not on our side. Just an hour after my mother left the hospital, it was surrounded, trapping everyone inside. My brother and cousin, who were with my father, were now besieged with him, leaving us on our own.

My father’s injury wasn’t critical, but he required surgery and an orthopedic specialist. Yet, with the hospital under siege, doctors couldn’t get in. The network signal was weak, and our communication with them became difficult.

What we heard wasn’t good.

My father’s condition started to worsen: he developed a fever, high blood pressure and nausea, and his wound and bone became infected. All the medical team present in the hospital could do was change his dressing. Supplies and resources were limited.

And again

We were still awake when dawn broke on 23 October, tormented by the unrelenting sounds of bombings and gunfire that seemed to strike the very roof above us. Then, over loudspeakers, drones called on everyone to leave their homes in northern Gaza and head to Salah al-Din Street, the main north-south thoroughfare in Gaza.

People around us were already leaving, yet we were torn. How could we abandon my father and brother and cousin, still trapped in the hospital?

But staying meant exposing ourselves to constant danger. We had no choice but to go.

With bags in hand, we joined the streams of people heading toward Salah al-Din Street. Before leaving, we managed to reach my father by phone to reassure him and let him know we were moving again.

He encouraged us, though his voice broke as he began to cry. He urged us not to put ourselves in danger. We said our goodbyes and began our journey.

We walked from Beit Lahiya in fierce heat, wearing winter clothes to carry as much as possible, as we could only carry so many bags. We had to leave most things behind, knowing the journey would be long.

As we neared the Indonesian hospital in Beit Lahiya, we saw tanks blocking the road, their loudspeakers ordering us to “Move to the right!” We followed their commands, but as we approached, I saw more than ten tanks surrounding us. They began taking young men – even boys – out of the crowd, separating them from their families.

Some children tried hiding among the women, but the soldiers found them, one by one. I saw mothers whispering, “go on, don’t be afraid,” even as their children’s faces were contorted in terror.

We walked until exhaustion forced people to drop bags, leaving belongings scattered along the road. Each time we tried to pause, the soldiers would rev their engines, stirring up dust, pushing us forward with mocking smiles. We had no choice but to keep going, despite our growing despair.

Along the way, we passed an elderly woman who had fallen from her wheelchair, her daughters unable to lift her, forcing them to leave her behind. A mother lost her young daughter on the uneven, sandy road, and, in her grief, continued on without looking back.

By the time we reached the Zamo roundabout, southeast of Jabaliya refugee camp, hope had faded. Exhausted, we felt that death would have been preferable to such humiliation. My mother dropped her bags, collapsing to the ground and saying, “I can’t go on. Let me die here.”

But after a few minutes, she gathered herself, picked up the bags, and kept moving. At the Qerem roundabout, we finally found a broken-down car that took us to a relative’s home.

Postscript

My father, Osama and Karam are still besieged at al-Awda hospital in Jabaliya. My father’s wound has reopened and he is in desperate need of surgery.

We have learned, also, that our beloved Falfoul is still in the house where we’d been bombed, sitting in the very spot where my father had been injured, as if waiting for us to return.

Asil Almanssi is a writer based in Gaza.

Tags

• eiGazaDispatches
• Gaza genocide
• Gaza war crimes
• Jabaliya
• forcible displacement

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