A Non-violent Woman is Eventually Targeted by the Israel Defense Forces

Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR), December 4, 2018

Around a month and a half after being injured by the Israeli forces, pain so far dwells in the body of Palestinian woman Malinah al-Hendi (34) and hinders her responsibility of taking care of her family.

Malinah, mother of six children, was shot by an Israeli sniper with a bullet that penetrated the right side of her abdomen while its shrapnel settled in her back to remain a source of suffering and concern, a reminder of difficult moments when she almost lost her life; and a witness to the most prominent form of violence the Palestinian women suffer from on the World Day To End Violence against Women.

The details of the incident seem to be present in the memory of the wounded woman as if it was today, and how not to be when her body pulses with pain every moment.

Malinah said to PCHR’s fieldworker that: “On Friday, 26 October 2018, as every Friday, I was participating in the Return demonstration, east of Khuza’ah village, but this time, the demonstration moved from its ususal location in the northern side of the Return encampment to its southeastern side, precisely in front of the Israeli diggers.”

On that day afternoon, events rapidly escalated as the relocation of the demonstration enraged the Israeli snipers, who redeployed in a hurry in front of the demonstration and started heavily firing live bullets at the protestors.

Demonstrators started falling one by one, and there were news about civilians killed. Ambulances’ sirens did not stop as they were constantly moving between the demonstration location and the field hospital. Malina was stepping to the eastern side raising the Palestinian flag and approaching the border fence with Israel.

Malinah was silent for a while as she seemed to be affected and then said: “I was raising the Palestinian flag and approaching the border fence with a number of protestors. The Israeli snipers stationed on sand berms along the border fence were clearly seeing me as neither the other protestors nor I were posing any threat to their lives.”

Malinah saw the Israeli forces firing a barrage of teargas canisters at the area, so she turned to warn a group of protestors, who were around her. Suddenly, she felt a strong hit to the right side of her abdomen. Malinah said: “I did not know what happened, but the pain was very severe. I then started running to move away from the area and with each move, the pain got worse.”

Malinah was touching the right side of her body as she felt pain. She added: “I was able to reach a sand berm behind which a group of protestors were. I noticed a swelling and blood in the right side of my body and felt so much pain. Immediately, a group of paramedics approached and carried me on a litter to an ambulance.”

In that moment, the pictures of Malinah’s children were flashing one by one. While she was mid-conscious, she said to her friend who got with her into the ambulance: “take care of my children please.”

She turned her face in an attempt not to hear the news about her death. She added: “my eldest son is in the 10^th grade and the youngest is in the 5^th grade.” I felt that my end is near, so I feared for my children and who would take care of them if anything happened to me, so my will for my friend was to take care of them.”

In the medical point, which was stuffed full with injuries (the toll of victims on that day was 3 persons killed and 52 others wounded, according to PCHR’s documentation), it was found out that Malinah was hit with a live bullet that settled in her abdomen. Malinah’s condition was serious, so she was immediately taken to the Gaza European Hospital in Khan Yunis.

It turned out that the live bullet settled in her back and one of its shrapnel settled near her kidney. Her health condition was classified serious, but Allah’s will was merciful.

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Nadya Siyam receives award at AFSC office in Gaza.

Gaza Unlocked Blog Team, American Friends Service Committee, December 3, 2018

Nadya Siyam lives in Gaza city and studies English Language and Literature at the Islamic University. She is a writer for the “We are Not Numbers” project where she writes in a narrative style about inspiring daily experiences in Gaza. Nadya also participates in community service activities at local institutions in Gaza. She loves to read, and her favorite genres are historical fiction and thrillers. “I’m highly interested in human rights, and I aspire to get a scholarship and pursue my master’s degree in this area,” said Nadya.

“30 Minutes… A Thousand Times Over”

At times of war you become extra alarmed. You become a navigator as you try to predict how far each bombing is from your house and who of your beloved lives near the area you’ve predicted. And when you’re done with your calculations, you pray you were wrong.

My dad works as an orthopedic surgeon at Gaza’s largest hospital, Al-Shifa Hospital. Whenever there is an attack on Gaza, dad, along with other doctors, stays at Al-Shifa for days to deal with the huge number of injured they must treat. Operation Protective Edge, the 2014 assault on Gaza, was no different.

My four little siblings, mum and I stayed alone without dad throughout the 50-day assault. Dad used to call us once every day and insisted to speak to each of us separately, even if it was for 10 seconds. Yousef, our youngest, was a year-and-a-half old then. He would hold the phone with his two tiny hands and say the very few words he was able to pronounce “Baba, yella ta’al” (come on dad, come home). Being the eldest, I had to wait until they were all done talking to hear dad’s voice at last.

– Be safe. Take care of your mum and siblings. Distract our little ones. Make sure the door is locked and the windows are open.

– Okay, Dad.

Dad…please come home, at least at night. We worry about you.

-They need me here. And I’m safe, sweetie. Come on, you know nobody bombs a hospital.

He stopped me from objecting any further with a short tired laugh. He sounded older, maybe because of the lack of sleep.

One afternoon, my mum and I were preparing Iftar (the meal that Muslims break their fasts with during Ramadan) and listening to the news on the radio. It got to the point when we couldn’t keep up with the number of deaths and injuries. Most of the reported bombings that day were in Rafah and Khan Younis – the southern parts of Gaza Strip. We lived in the northern west part of the strip, so the sound of bombings was far.

The landline phone rang.

The voice of my uncle attacked my ear with a loud piercing scream as I picked the phone. “Why isn’t he picking the phone? Your dad is home, right?” he cried hysterically.

“No,” I replied with my shaky voice, “he is at Al-Shifa. What’s going on?”

His voice was lower this time. It seemed he was crying; however, I immediately dismissed that thought. “Ya rabi, oh God! They threatened to bomb Al-Shifa. The IDF called for an evacuation. They’re going to bomb the hospital,” my uncle said.

Loneliness crept into me, and I had a sudden desire to have a regular chat with dad. I wanted to make him tea – extra mint – and complain to him about school and homework. Then he would call me a huge drama queen while pulling me into a fast hug. We could watch the movie “Taken” for the hundredth time. Dad would say a couple of times throughout the movie, “it’s incredible what a father would go through for his daughter.” And I would roll my eyes and say, “it’s over exaggerated.”

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Rahf Hallaq receives her award at the Gaza AFSC office.

Gaza Unlocked Blog Team, American Friends Service Committee, December 3, 2018

Rahf Hallaq is a 19-year-old sophomore student at the Islamic university of Gaza studying English Literature. She aspires to complete her higher education in Literature and become a professor. Reading is her favourite hobby that started with her love for bedtime stories as a child, and with time developed into an appreciation of literature. Rahf lived and went to school in the U.S. for three years (2005 to 2008) where she began reading and writing in English at a very early stage in her life. Rahf says, “Books changed the way I think immensely; I could feel writers speaking to me through every book I read, trying to form my ideas, make me a better well-informed person. That made me love writing because it made me believe in the power of words. I write because I want to share what I know with the world. I want them to see how people here suffer, feel and think. I want them to see that we are not merely an occupied nation that wants its basic rights but that we have amazing, educated, creative and brilliant people here in Gaza that can achieve great things and make this world a better place if given the opportunity.”

“The Party”

“There’s going to be a party tonight!”

It’s 12 a.m. The entire house had gone to sleep and I’m sitting lazily on my desk studying, trying my best to ignore the infuriating buzz of the drones roaming above my head. I read the message my friend sent me, smile and reply with a “yeah!” I have to finish as much as possible before the electricity goes out. So, although I feel extremely tired, I keep working.

There were four killings on the border today and our side threw some rockets at the Israeli soldier camps near the borders as a response. So, as usual, I was expecting a night full of action. But, you see, Israelis never respond to the results of what they started early. They always wait until it’s past midnight so that their mission’s results can be more successfully terrifying.

It is said that waiting for a bad experience to happen is harder than living the experience itself. I can’t say that I’m sitting on pins and needles or that I’m actually scared, however. Situations such as these happen every now and then in Gaza.

I haven’t reached the level of complete indifference as some people here have, but neither do I feel any great fear as some others still do. We always fear the airstrikes might cause casualties near the targeted places. And there’s always the fear of things escalating and possibly developing into a serious war. But, there have been enough similar nights or – as people here in Gaza have come to ironically call them – “parties” to convince us that the possibility is weak. Usually, everything ends with the rising sun of the following day. It’s a strategy they use to scare us and remind us: “we are here.”

So, I sit and wait.

I wait just like everyone here waits for everything. Our life in Gaza, as some of you might already know, is a constant state of fearing and waiting. We are always waiting for electricity so that we can resume our lives like normal people, study, work, do our chores, watch TV, charge our phones and laptops, etc. New graduates are always waiting to find a job, and if, after a long search by some miracle, they do find a good suitable job, they will have the exceptional experience of waiting to be paid half their salary once every three months.

We are constantly waiting for the Rafah border to open, waiting for medical supplies, waiting for a war that we dread yet know is coming, waiting for an airstrike, waiting for the siege to end, waiting for freedom, or waiting for things to simply improve; we feel privileged when we get a full eight hours of electricity!

Some people have started to look upon these things as a distant Godot who never comes. A Godot that keeps you waiting and hoping until he renders you desperate. People like me, though, are still clinging to the hope that things will get better soon. Every nation that has been occupied in the past has had to sacrifice for its freedom. We’ve been resisting dispossession, slaughter, imprisonment, and torture for 70 years. Are we to give up now?

The first missile strikes, and as my heart starts thumping hard in my chest, I automatically jump out of my chair to open the windows. A shiver runs through my body as gusts of cold wind slap my face. But what other choice do we have? We’ll have to bear the cold for a couple of hours. I cover my younger siblings well and go back to studying.

However prepared or indifferent you may be, you never escape feeling that bitter sensation of being punched in the stomach whenever you hear the missiles breaking through the layers of air, whistling all the way down, then smashing unmercifully into the ground. For the next hour, I was neither able to sleep nor concentrate on my homework. Most of it passes in thinking and absentmindedly watching the curtain above my desk dance forward and backward instead. There were nearly five other airstrikes during that hour; and with each one of them, my heart leapt into my throat, causing my guts and lungs to clench themselves until I could hardly breathe for a few moments. Then everything went back to normal.

A murmur reaches me from my parents’ room. The bombing must have wakened them. I slowly walk to their room to see if everything’s alright. Everything is fine. As I tip-toe back to my room, my dad catches me and calls: “Go to sleep, baba; there’s nothing serious. Hopefully, the IDF will get bored soon and move to another spot.”

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