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At any moment, Israel could launch a ground offensive in Gaza.
I can’t stop thinking about 11-year-old Rafah guiding me through the rubble of her bombed-out girls’ room two years ago.
Where is she going now?
In the middle of the night, the roof collapsed. Broken glass, cracked iron beams, sheet metal crumpled up like paper. Rafah Nasir, 11, showed the mattress where she slept. Until the family escaped the fireball in the middle of the night.
– Suddenly everything exploded. I thought the house was going to fall on me, she explained.
It was May 2021. I visited Gaza to report on the latest bloody eleven-day war with Israel. Her family lived in Beit Hanoun, a town in the northeastern Gaza Strip, near Israel’s barbed wire and fence.
Entire neighborhoods were in ruins. A desert of cement and rebar. Houses gaped like dollhouses.
The SMS to Gaza
Nevertheless, Rafah was bubbling with energy, rambling phrases in English “Hello my name is”, and wanted so badly to tell more. Although the vocabulary was not always enough.
In her short life she had already experienced war after war. Despite the trauma, she was in many ways like any other eleven-year-old. Liked Tiktok and Nutella.
Rafah and I exchanged numbers.
We would keep in touch.
Now, two years later, the bombs are raining down on Gaza again. After Hamas’s bloody surprise attack last week, Israel is seeking revenge.
A ground offensive is planned. Civilians are advised to evacuate.
I send a text to Rafah. And one more.
Buried alive alongside his dead mother
In recent years I have reported from North Korea, Ukraine, the USA. But few places have made such an impression as bombed-out Gaza.
The labyrinthine cities, the children among the ruins. Close, but still the universe from Tel Aviv’s party line.
Two million people, half of whom are children, are trapped on a narrow strip of land between the wall and the sea, with limited access to drinking water, healthcare and electricity. A border controlled by Israel.
That is why Gaza is called “the world’s largest open prison”.
As another war rages, I think of those we met.
The boy with shrapnel in his stomach.
The girl without shoes.
7-year-old Souzey, who was buried in rubble for seven hours with her dead mother, and was so traumatized that she stopped talking.
The doctor who went on his knees.
The bloodshed, Israel’s oppression. Show the world! they pleaded.
But Hamas weapons forges in underground tunnel systems under civilians in Gaza?
It wanted to be felt by adults.
Defensible massacre in the eyes of Hamas
After the ceasefire, we followed the terrorist-branded Hamas military parade. They marched from town to town in Gaza, heavily armed. Celebrating success in a roaring carnival atmosphere. They wanted to pick up children on the trucks to let them pose with automatic weapons and the “heroes”.
Some cheered for the “freedom fighters” during the propaganda parade – many did not. Hamas rules with an iron fist in Gaza. Without freedom of opinion.
When I interviewed a Hamas spokesperson, he summed up the cycles of violence with the archenemy this way:
– In boxing, you have two choices: win by knockout or score points. We can’t beat the Israelis by knockout, but we know we can do it with points – and we have time.
Hamas probably thinks they have scored many “points” in recent days: Well over a thousand Israelis were killed in a grotesque massacre. 200 as a hostage. Children and the elderly.
Justifiable in the eyes of Hamas, after years of Israeli oppression.
Many refuse to leave their homes
Today the border into Gaza is closed. No foreign journalists come in, the reports are scarce. But many testify to horror and piles of corpses from inside the prison colony. A humanitarian disaster.
6,000 bombs have been dropped over the strip of land in a couple of days. Unlike in Israel, there are no flight alarms, no shelters, nowhere to run. Over 1,000 Gazan children are said to have died in recent bombings. Bloodier than in many years.
And the violence is believed to be escalating.
Goliath, Israel, is militarily superior. Now they are planning a ground offensive to take revenge on Hamas. They have urged over a million Gazans to evacuate in a flash.
An impossible project. Where will they go?
Many also refuse to leave their home, their land.
That is exactly what Israel wants, the Palestinians reason.
No more selfies and rose emojis
For the past two years, my friend Rafah has been sending selfies from inside Gaza. Loads of cute voicemails and rose emojis.
“You have kids?”, she messaged as the vocabulary swelled.
Rafah should be 13 today. She lived in the area that is now being asked to evacuate.
But there is no reply to my latest text messages.
In the best case, the mobile has been discharged.
I don’t want to think about the worst.