26 Jan: Will there be time to recover? Tales to Tell from Gaza

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Punk's Not Dead and Neither is Gaza

Portion below; whole thing here: http://talestotell.wordpress.com/2009/01/26/26-jan-will-there-be-time-to-recover/#more-792

Back in Gaza city late last night, we met by the sea to welcome back A, who returned through the Rafah border the day before, after his kidnap off a Gaza fishing boat by Israel late last year. It was hard to give him much of a festive welcome with the stories we had to tell.

Mo spoke of the Al Fukhary area, near his home, where due to lack of electricity for radios or phones, no-one had heard a thing about the danger of the phosphorous bombs, and thought they were just fireworks. Many people went out to see what they were, and received serious burns. C said that doctors treating phosphorous burns have been burnt themselves, she had unconfirmed reports that some even needed finger amputations.

And so many more stories, even just one or two steps from me.

Jilal, from Jabalia Red Crescent, who - like so many, many men - worked for ten years to afford his house, now destroyed.

Majed, my nurse friend from Al Awda hospital, whose aunt is in hospital with a fractured leg; her house fell on her.

Dr Halid’s wife and two little daughters, alone in their small tin-roofed house in Magazi refugee camp while he was cut off from them in Gaza city. They sheltered in the room they thought safest, but it was struck by a rocket. They moved to another room, it was struck by a second rocket. A final rocket struck the third room they tried. Now the family is living with Dr H’s father.

Basma from the UHWC, who tells me about the family that called her, crying, to say they had no home and no possessions and were going to have to sleep on the street that night.

Hamse, our 21 year old security guard with whom all the other internationals (who are not so stroppy about police guards as I am) made friends. He survived the first day attacks that killed so many police, but was killed later. He leaves a 5 month old daughter.

Dr Waleed, Medical Director Al Quds Hospital; his friend has a leg amputation with continuing complications. She woke in the night with the feeling she should move her family out of the room they were in. After shifting them, she went back there herself and the room was hit.

V interviewed Dalal, the 12 year old whose entire family died while she was with her grandma. Her house is destroyed, all that is left her is her cat.

And Amira, who crawled, injured, to the house of my friend Haider Eid ’s cousin. Haider wrote about her on Electronic Intifada:

14-year old Amira Qirm, whose house in Gaza City was shelled with artillery and phosphorous bombs - bombs which burnt to death 3 members of her immediate family: her father, her 12-year-old brother, Ala’a, and her 11-year old sister, Ismat. Alone, injured and terrified, Amira crawled 500m on her knees to a house close by – it was empty because the family had fled when the Israeli attack began. She stayed there for 4 days, surviving only on water, and listening to the sounds of the Israeli killing machine all around her, too afraid to cry out in pain in case the soldiers heard her. When the owner of the house returned to get clothes for his family, he found Amira, weak and close to death.