From Lama in Gaza, Sunday 16 July 2006
Coming back from the hospital, Faten hugged Marwan (4) as soon as he entered her flat. Nour (2) began to cry loudly. Everyone thought that Nour was jealous so Faten went to embrace him, too. But he left her and went to his cousin, Marwan, and started to hug him, repeating over and over again the word "Habibi" (darling) for the first time in his life.
Marwan and Nour live with their parents in Saudi Arabia, where their father works. They came to visit the family in Gaza this summer with their mother, Ghada. Because of the current situation they decided to stay at their uncle's and aunt's house near the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
In another part of the world, in Saudi Arabia, their father was watching the news at 1.30 in the morning. Suddenly, he saw his sister and her children in the ambulance and then in the hospital. He kept looking for his family, wife and children but did not see them on the television screen. He saw Marwan in the hospital bed with his mother and sister, all being treated by the hospital staff, but there was no sign of his children. His first thought was that they lay dead under the rubble. After a few calls, awakening all the members of the family in Gaza, he realized that they were all safe in another brother’s house.
Laila, Faten’s sister, who is an employee in our organization, was telling us this story the next morning while we were watching the news on television and saw the same pictures the father was watching the night before.. We all had tears in our eyes. After that the news and the scenes from Lebanon. The destruction of the infrastructure, the destruction of houses full of families, the same scenes everywhere, in Gaza, in Ramallah, in Nablus, in the villages of Southern Lebanon, in Beirut, in Saida, in Sour, etc.
The same aggressor everywhere, Israel. The same F16s, the same Apaches, the same canons, the same soldiers and always the same excuses.
It is 16 July today. I started writing this message three days ago but because of the electricity and the flood of different news I could not continue. We have been following the news for almost 24 hours, rarely by television, mainly by radio. The Israeli aggression is continuing and at the same time the complaints of Israel are continuing, too.
Israel begins by hitting the infrastructure of its neighbours, targeting civilians, who must defend themselves and hit back. Israel, the owner of the fourth strongest army in the world, the possessor of atomic bombs, the occupier of the lands of Lebanon, Syria and Palestine, with thousands of Palestinian and Arab prisoners in its jails, the holder of the Palestinian civilians in the occupied territory as hostages, needs to defend itself ????
It is really a strange world. All the governments of the allegedly democratic world are condemning the kidnapping of a regular army soldier but not one of these democratic states stands firmly against the brutality and aggression of Israeli state terrorism against a civilian population.
Countless United Nations resolutions have guaranteed the rights of Palestinians, Lebanese and Syrians to regain their occupied land and the Palestinian right to build their state on the land occupied in 1967 but Israel does not obey. On the contrary, Israel is constructing an apartheid wall in the West Bank which is destroying the future state of Palestine and is setting the basis for its final, illegal borders. The democratic world is still accusing us, the victims, of being terrorists and is asking us to recognize the right of Israel to kill each and every one of us, using the justification self-defense.
The news is still coming. In Beit Hanoun, a northern town of the Gaza Strip, the Israeli army is surrounding four families (each family counts at least 15 members), asking them to leave their houses because they want to destroy them. The families have refused to leave so they have been given half an hour or the army will destroy the houses with the families inside.
The occupation army, still in the same town, is destroying the fences around governmental schools. The occupation army takes possession of a five-story building, which includes a kindergarten, a library, a women's center and the administration of the trade union of the female workers in the kindergarten.
The news is still coming while I'm writing this. I've been asked by a friend to write about our suffering in Gaza. An Israeli and a Lebanese woman will write as well and these pieces will be published in France. I wonder what to write? I know that the suffering of civilians everywhere who are forced to live in such circumstances is the same. I know that mothers, regardless of their nationality, of their religion, suffer the same for the loss of a child. I know that the look of a child who is subjected to war is the same. Please give us a chance, as women, as mothers, as human beings, to raise our children in peace and in a loving atmosphere instead of in fear and hatred.
The people living in the first, democratic world can hardly feel what we in the region are going through, especially now, when it is the time of summer holidays. Nevertheless, we ask their support to put pressure on their governments to stop the madness of the Israeli Government and its army, which wants to destroy the entire region.
I believe in a peaceful solution for the conflict in the region, based on international law and the resolutions of the United Nations. But where is the United Nations? It is defending the aggressor, isn’t it?
I have nothing to add. I have a huge anger inside me, like everyone in the region. I want to scream to all of the people of the world, believers in god, or different gods, or non-believers. We all believe in the right of the human being to live in dignity and safety. It is a scream for people to move, to protest Israeli brutality, to force Israel to stop its madness and crimes.