The Electronic Intifada 12 October 2024
The tent area in al-Mawasi where the author has been displaced.
The Electronic IntifadaOver a year ago, before 7 October 2023 and before this nightmare, my family in Gaza and I had a simple life full of ambitions and goals.
I was a student in high school, and the school year had just begun. I planned to do my best, study hard and strive to achieve the highest grades in my class.
I had a dream and intended to pursue it.
But I didn’t know that I live in a territory where we don’t have the right to dream or plan.
On the first day of this bloody war, we thought that it would only last days and the nightmare would soon end. So I worked hard and studied the math lesson that I took two days before the war.
On 9 October 2023, there was an Israeli bombing in front of our building on al-Nasr street in Gaza City. It was a day full of terror.
One night, at 1:00 am, we were about to go to sleep when we heard one of our neighbors knocking on the door.
He told us to go to the ground floor as the Israeli military had ordered a building next to us to evacuate.
We left our homes and stayed on the streets waiting for our fate.
“Will we survive or will it be our last night?” This question never left our minds that night.
In the end, it was a false alarm.
I am convinced the Israeli military enjoyed seeing us nervous and running for our lives. We have seen the videos where they mock and dehumanize us, wearing women’s clothes and violently rifling through our houses and stores.
We returned to our homes, but deep inside, each of us felt anxious.
Displacement
On 13 October 2023, our house was full of people who had been forced to leave their homes to save themselves.
We were again informed that we would have to leave our house, but this time to flee to the south.
What made it more bleak and distressing is that my father lacked contacts to call people who might have welcomed us into their homes in the south, as he is Syrian.
“I don’t know where to evacuate as I have no relatives in the south,” I recall my father telling us.
We left our home and headed to the southern area of Khan Younis. It was the most terrifying feeling I have ever experienced, leaving the familiar comforts of our home and moving toward the unknown.
We went to relatives on my mother’s side of the family (specifically, relatives of my uncle’s wife). We stayed in a small apartment with approximately 30 other people. The flat we went to had a spacious living room, but only one bedroom. Our number was rather large to fit into this small place.
We spent two months in Khan Younis.
It was difficult, but we kept repeating that our situation is better than that of many Palestinians who have to live on the streets.
We were displaced again due to the worsening situation in Khan Younis after the Israeli military proclaimed it a war zone.
We continued on to Rafah, where we found an apartment for rent. It lacked any basic necessities for life.
We sorted out our affairs and prepared for the challenges ahead. We had to live, so we had to accept our fate.
Surviving
On 20 December, God gave us a new chance to live and survive.
The garden of the building in which we rented an apartment was bombed yet we miraculously survived.
There is no safe place, not in Gaza City, not in Khan Younis, not in Rafah.
We started the new year cold, hungry and sick, patiently waiting for this nightmare to end.
But since December, this horrible Israeli onslaught has continued for more than nine months.
In early May, we hoped it would stop with a ceasefire. We were briefly happy as the news seemed promising.
We woke up days later, however, to a notification from the Israeli military that our region was now considered a war zone and we should flee to the “safe” areas. “Rafah is a war zone,” the Israeli military declared. We heard this sentence repeatedly when we were displaced from Gaza City, Khan Younis and finally from Rafah.
We went to al-Mawasi, west of Khan Younis, where we have been staying in a tent ever since.
It was difficult to adapt to this life, but we had no choice other than to accept it and be patient with the painful reality.
Yet even al-Mawasi is not considered safe.
On 13 July, we heard the sound of bombs and the targeting of land just a 15-minute walk from our area. The Israeli military killed scores and injured hundreds that day.
For nearly one year we have been away from our homes, our lives, our beautiful days and our sweet gatherings. I miss my room, my bed and the safety and comfort we felt. I miss our kitchen, the Gaza sea, and everything about our lives before 7 October 2023.
We have reached a stage where we say, if our ancestors didn’t return to their homes after the Nakba, including my mother’s family to the ethnically cleansed village of al-Qubaiba, is it possible for us to return to our homes in the north of Gaza?
Will this land also be stolen from us as the world watches and even arms the genocide, allowing anti-Palestinian bigots like retired Israeli major general Giora Eiland, finance minister Bezalel Smotrich and interior minister Itamar Ben-Gvir to get their way?
Every time we hear news about negotiations ending this war, we become hopeful and say we might return.
But the next day, we hear news of new evacuations and new displacements. Then the usual question is asked again: Where will the people be displaced? Where will we go? Will we ever return home?
Dema Afif is a high school student from Gaza City.
