Our taxi wove through the narrow streets of Gaza, our driver giving us a brief tour of the horrors. We saw the house of Sheikh Yassin and the point where he was executed. Demolished Mosques, homes and businesses point the direction to the Zaytoun neighbourhood in south central Gaza City. The past few nights have been sleepless. The Israeli forces have attacked from land, sea and air. My home, close to the sea, echoed and shook with the pounding of the shelling on the nearby Beach Camp. Further into the centre of Gaza the people of Zaytoun (which means ‘olive’) have been imprisoned in the scene of some of the most intense fighting since the Intifada began. Read more about Israel's revenge in Zaytoun, Gaza
We were sitting outside a small shack at the edge of a Bedouin community in the Northern Gaza Strip region of Al-Sayafa. Abu Housa, one of the Bedouin elders, sat with us speaking in quick, expressive Arabic phrases, spreading his arms and flinging his hands about, the gestures adding emotional context to words that, for the most part, I could not understand. When we first arrived at the community we were quickly invited to sit in the shade of the shack and offered tea, as is customary here. Jacob Pace writes from Gaza City. Read more about Al-Sayafa: A Case Study in Dispossession
One of my recurring nightmares is about a coming tidal wave. It’s my second least favorite recurring nightmare. My least favorite being the ones about the end of the world. In my tidal wave dreams, the scariest part is the waiting. I know it’s coming. I can see it and I know it will be bad but I also know i can’t run fast enough to get out of the way. Alternatively, I’m stuck and can’t move. Either way the dream sucks… Read more about Gaza: The coming tidal wave
To relax, go to the closed checkpoint on the way to Rafah beach. For extreme sports, go to Gaza City and dodge Apache missiles… Laura Gordon writes from Gaza City. Read more about Vacationing in the Gaza Strip
“Since the current situation and both recent and long-term history have proven that in the eyes of the Israelis, all Palestinians are wanted, they can continue to kill whichever Palestinians they want. Their target today was Al-Rantisi from Hamas. They killed a little girl and a woman instead.” Kristen Ess writes from Bethlehem. Read more about Israeli military continues to kill through "cease fire"
At 3am the Israeli military invaded the northern Gaza Strip town of Beit Hanoun with Apache helicopters and tanks. The bulldozers demolished 100s of trees, further desecrating the land. If one were not watching this happen, it might be easy to arrive here next year and truly believe that this was a land without a people. The Israeli military has destroyed thousands of dunams of orange and olive trees, shrubs, grass, and life. The US donated helicopters fired missiles into the Beit Hanoun Palestinian National Security building, killing two men who were at work. Kristen Ess writes from Gaza. Read more about Myriad forms of ethnic cleansing
Those Palestinians who were banished following Israel’s siege of the Church of the Nativity languish in Gaza, their families in Bethlehem. Kristen Ess crosses from Bethlehem to Gaza, to report on how families are dealing with the separation. Read more about In Exile: Bethlehem to Gaza
The Palestinian people have begun to lose all hope and trust in the institutions and mechanisms of the international community. A society that has always valued large families, healthy children, and hospitality is now unable to provide even a minimal amount of milk for its babies. It is time for solidarity, not just sympathy, from the international community. Read more about Wanted: Solidarity, not Tears
Jennifer LoewensteinGaza City, Palestine13 August 2002
There is a bouquet of plastic purple flowers in the center of a cheap wooden table. It’s easier to stare at it than into the faces of either of the men speaking. The air is suffocatingly hot — no breeze passes through the half-open window. I’m thirsty but won’t drink the orange soda our host passes around in paper cups. Read more about Gaza: Blood for blood, a meditation on power
Jennifer LoewensteinGaza City, Palestine22 July 2002
F-16 Warplanes zoom overhead daily. In Rafah they’ve been breaking the sound barrier. At night you can watch flares light up the sky. Read more about Gaza: Summer in the Strip