It was a quiet day
It was just a quiet, wonderful day in Gazza Friday 5th August. The family members usually gather together because this day is special for all Arab and Muslim countries in general and for Palestinians in private. I had my lunch with my family and then I went to take a little nap. I got up and just asked my wife for a cup of coffee in order to search the internet and see my social sites Facebook and twitter.
I was planning to take my children to the sea due to the high temperatures that we have here in the strip. Suddenly, I was shocked when I saw the first footages of the Israeli bombardments to a building. Later they said that a top Jihad commander was assassinated by an Israeli raid.
Meanwhile, I was confused of the news that Islamic Jihad will retaliate and avenge the assassination of it’s commander. I witnessed three previous wars and I saw a lot of dead people that were targeted by the Israeli army and of course the injured people.
My family and I used to flee the area that we live in because it is near the boarders and it used to be a war zone and it is very dangerous to stay.
After seeing the news and after I heard the sound of shelling and the sound of rockets, immediately without hesitation I decided to leave my house and to go to city center in order to stay in a safe and comfortable flat away from the danger of rockets and shelling.
The first night was very terrible and we couldn’t sleep because of the sound of shelling and also the sound of rockets launching. We succeeded to get a few hours to sleep during the day. We got up to take our breakfast and at that time we heard a huge sound of explosion and It was near the building that we moved in. We rushed to the windows to see where is the raid. Sadly, the raid was to a house and the raid left many martyrs and injuries. I looked to my kids and saw that they are very frightened of the explosion. I tried to calm them down by telling them that it is was not an explosion and it is just another sound. The night of Gaza in the war is unique. People in Gaza hate the night in the war because it is not quite at all. You only hear the sound of the bombardments. Children are supposed to hear the sound of a beautiful music that could make them go to sleep deeply. But in Gaza children go to bed hearing the sound of bombardments and get up to the same sound.
My father works as a farmer, he cultivates strawberries and he has a farmer of cucumber. During the days of the war, Gaza suffers from the lack of electricity and the power station in Gaza didn’t work due to shortage in fuel that come from Israel. Israel blocked the crossings with Gaza just before the aggression with 4 days. This caused a shortage of electricity in the Strip.
My father was obliged to go to his farm to irrigate his crops in the night. This is a very dangerous try because Israel targets all things that move during the night. Farmers in Gaza suffer from electricity shortage and also from the escalation. A lot of them couldn’t reach their fields due to the tension between factions in Gaza and Israel.
I’m a teacher of English language in a secondary school in Gaza and I was waiting for my salary if we could name it a salary because employees in didn’t take the full amount of their salaries. They got only 50% of the salaries. war came and I didn’t get the salary and this made the situation worse. When you leave your zone to another one forcibly without enough money, you will suffer a lot.
During the last escalation in Gaza, I witnessed a very hard scene It was when rockets were launched towards Israel , a sudden raid happened in a near area The raid left nearly 8 martyrs and dozens of injuries.
A very sad story of a woman that lost her only child in this raid. She was in the hospital because she is a nurse and she is doing her duty. They told her that you son was among those who were killed in the raid. The woman she very shocked and sad.
Finally, in my country a woman carries her son twice: When she is pregnant with him and when she holds his coffin bidding farewell to him!
